
Class __JlJ2_A^Li 
Book.— 



COfyRIGHT DEPOSm 



SURE FEED CROPS 



BY 

JOHN FIELDS 

Editor Oklahoma Farm Journal 



OKLAHOMA CITY 

OKLAHOMA FARM JOURNAL 

1912 



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Copyright, 1912, by 

JOHN FIELDS 

All rights reserved 



©Cl-^.3o0::;84 



CONTENTS 



PAGig 

General Statements •••...• 1 

The Grain: 

Kafircorn 7 

Milomaize 33 

Cottonseed Products 44 

The Forage: 

Alfalfa ,. 53 

Cowpeas 100 

Peanuts Ill 

Sorghum 118 

Millet 123 

Silage 125 

The Pasture: 

Bermuda Grass 135 

Other Grasses and Clovers 164 

Annual Pasture Crops 177 

Rainfall and Cropsi by George L. Bishop 179 



To the men, women, and children who are 
building and maintaining homes on the farms 
of the Central Southwest, and whose friendship 
and esteem are valued above all things else, this 
book is dedicated by 

THE AUTHOE. 



SURE FEED CROPS. 



GENERAL STATEMENTS 

1. Abundant and regular supplies of feed for 

livestock are vital to individual and collective 
agricultural prosperity. Livestock always have 
been the basis of every permanently profitable 
system of farming. Without the certainty of 
production of abundant feed crops, in unfavor- 
able as well as in favorable years, the raising of 
livestock on the farm is as likely to result in 
loss as in profit through a series of years. If, at 
irregular periods, because of shortage of feed, 
it is necessary for farmers to dispose of their 
livestock, they must do so on a falling market at 
a great loss. Their investment in equipment for 
the care of livestock becomes unproductive and 
the entire system of farming becomes disar- 
ranged. When the time of plenty comes again, 
the building up of the breeding herds is a slow 
and expensive process. The supply is short and 
the demand is strong, making prices high. 

2. Wide variations in climatic conditions in 

the United States call for greater differences in 
agricultural practice than have generally been 
recognized. The farmers from the Atlantic 
coast states who pushed into the unknown, set- 



2 SUEE FEED CEOPS 

tling the Ohio valleys; the prairies of Indiana, 
Illinois, and Iowa; the valleys and plains of 
Kansas, Oklahoma, and Texas; brought with 
them their stores of practical experience in 
farming. Each at first followed the methods 
and tried to grow the crops to which he was 
accustomed. Many still do so. Capital for the 
development of new localities was required; it 
must be had from the old states, and the men 
who controlled it must be convinced that condi- 
tions are as they expected them to be. Scientific 
investigation of all matters pertaining to agri- 
culture in the United States began along the 
eastern border; text and reference books relat- 
ing to farming have largely been written from 
the standpoint of conditions which do not exist 
in Kansas, Oklahoma, and Texas. Every influ- 
ence has tended to cause farmers in these states 
to follow the old methods and grow the old 
crops. 

3. A system of farming, based upon experi- 
ence and experiment in these states of the Cen- 
tral Southwest, where rainfall is always vari- 
able and often deficient, and where strong winds 
and high summer temperatures introduce condi- 
tions unknown to farmers of the Northern and 
Atlantic coast states, must be developed and 
adopted. With limitations and modifications 
which are indicated elsewhere in this volume, 
the general plan of operations should be the 
following: 

Not less than ten acres of kafircorn or milo- 



GENEKAL STATEMENTS 3 

maize should be planted in April, May, or June 
every year on every farm. When drouth comes, 
they produce as much grain as corn averages 
in the best years ; and the better the soil and the 
season, the higher the yield of these drouth- 
resisters. 

Corn should be planted only on bottom lands. 

Every acre of good, rich bottom land should 
be put to alfalfa as soon as possible. 

The washy soils, hillsides, rough places, alkali 
lands, and low, overflow bottoms should be set 
to hardy bermuda grass, wherever this grass 
thrives. 

The smooth, tillable uplands and prairies 
should be planted to kafircorn or milomaize for 
a sure crop of grain for feed and sale, to cowpeas 
and peanuts for feed and forage and soil im- 
provement, and to oats, wheat, broom corn, and 
cotton for cash crops, wherever the soil and 
climate are suitable. 

Those who follow such a system, stick to it, 
and feed most of what they produce to good 
livestock, will be the ultimate owners of the 
farms of the Central Southwest. 

4. Production must replace speculation before 
farming will be on a safe business basis. Jor a 
period in the eighties and early nineties in 
Kansas, and until very recently in Oklahoma 
and Texas, the get-rich-quick idea seemed to 
dominate everything. The influence of the 
towns, where nearly everything centered around 
schemes to sell lots for greater and still greater 



4 SURE FEED CROPS 

prices, extended to the farms. The purpose of 
those who farmed seemed to be to get the land 
into such shape and crops as would make it sell 
readily to someone else whose purpose was not 
to make it his home, but to sell at a higher 
figure to still others with the same idea. Per- 
manent agricultural prosperity cannot come 
until attention is turned from speculation to 
production. Whatever has been unfavorable in 
the past has been largly the fault of men who 
have hoped for a change in climatic conditions 
to suit their desires and who have failed to 
appreciate the fact that regular and certain 
production of crops, every year, is the only 
foundation for permanent land values. 

5. Rainfall does not increase and the climate 
does not change as the result of the occupation 
of any region by men. ^'The So-Called Change 
of Climatic Conditions in the Semiarid West" 
is fully discussed in an article by Richard H. 
Sullivan, Local Forecaster, Weather Bureau, 
Wichita, Kansas, in the 1908 Yearbook of the 
IT. S. Department of Agriculture. He states: 
''It is the man that has changed, not the climate, 
and the face of nature has changed with efforts 
far exceeding those of the early eastern 
pioneers. The western man who has observed 
the wilderness blossom as the rose decries Ms 
own power when he charges to the account of 
change of dimate the blessings resulting from 
his own initiative. It required much more than 
the buzzing of the drones while the climate was 



GENERAL STATEMENTS 5 

* changing' to make orchards, meadows, grain 
fields, and vineyards in Oklahoma, Kansas, 
Colorado, Nebraska, and the Dakotas." And 
again: ^'We are led to the conclusion that the 
so-called changes in climate have been nothing 
more than irregular oscillations; that a succes- 
sion of dry years has given way to recurring wet 
years ; that there are alternating series of warm 
and cool years ; that drouths are possible in any 
part of the country at any time, winter or 
summer. ' ' 

6. '* Scientific agriculture '' has in recent 
years come to be an expression with which to 
conjure and to obtain increased appropriations 
and additional jobs for friends of the adminis- 
tration, both national and state. ''Scientists" 
who know but little of science have developed 
*' systems'' which they insist will grow corn, 
whether it rains or not. Those with lands for 
sale in regions of limited and variable rainfall 
have lured the hopeful settler on and, in count- 
less cases, left him stranded. The mysterious 
hocus-pocus which is supposed to make the im- 
possible happen with regularity has been in- 
voked in all of its forms. But it is coming now 
to be understood that the problem of profitable 
farming in the Central Southwest has been 
solved by many farmers. It may be solved by 
all who will grow those crops and follow the 
methods which experience has demonstrated 
may be depended upon to produce an abundance 
of feed for livestock, no matter how unfavorable 



6 SURE FEED CEOPS 

the season. There is no better statement of the 
situation than that made by the late Dr. S. A. 
Knapp, who said: *^ Agriculture is not a science 
and it has but little science in it. That little 
science can be taught. The remainder must be 
acquired by observation, experience, and busi- 
ness methods. Agriculture might be defined as 
being about one-eighth science, three-eighths 
art, and half business." 



THE GRAIN 



KAFIRCORN 

7. Partial failures of Indian corn when the 
prairies of Kansas were being developed into 
farms brought heavy losses to many of the 
early settlers. In 1876, kafircorn was brought 
from South Africa, but it was not generally cul- 
tivated until 1890. The Kansas Experiment 
Station, from 1889 to 1900, investigated cultural 
methods and the feeding value of kafircorn. The 
Oklahoma Experiment Station, beginning in 
1892, followed similar lines of study. The con- 
clusions were widely published, but they were 
not generally adopted and put in practice by 
farmers. Public sentiment opposed the admis- 
sion that it was necessary to grow this drouth- 
resisting crop. Farmers who persisted in doing 
so were called '^ kafircorn woolies'' and urged 
to grow a ** dignified crop," such as Indian 
corn. 

8. Kafircorn made slow progress as an impor- 
tant crop. Butler county, Kansas, led in the 
production of kafircorn in 1911. In 1897, the 
farmers of this Kansas county planted 187,873 
acres to Indian corn and it brought a return of 
$2.30 per acre. They had begun learning a 

7 



g SURE FEED CROPS 

little of kafircorn and had 11,714 acres of it 
planted that year; it turned off $9.75 per acre. 
But the habit of planting large acreages of 
Indian corn is firmly fixed. In 1910, thirteen 
years later, these farmers had abandoned only 
one-third of the acreage of the crop which had 
brought in $2.30 per acre and had replaced it 
with the crop which cashed in for $9.75 per 
acre. In 1910, Butler county, Kansas, had 139,- 
924 acres planted to corn; it yielded $6.60 per 
acre. And the 58,789 acres planted to kafircorn 
turned in $13.00 per acre. 

9. The supreme test of kafircorn came in the 
season of 1911. Speaking of it, J. B. Adams 
of El Dorado, Kansas, who has had much to do 
with establishing kafircorn as a real crop in 
Butler county, said: ^*It was a season of un- 
usual severity, the dryest and hottest in Kansas 
as it was in Oklahoma since 1901. A pitiless 
sun burned up the Indian corn and parched the 
native grass upon the prairies. Throughout this 
trying ordeal, our unfailing friend, the hardy 
and indomitable kafir, stood sentinel upon the 
prairies with that patient fortitude inherent in 
its nature, born of centuries of hardship upon 
the desert; it bided its time and silently waited 
for rain, springing triumphantly into new life 
with the first downpour from the heavens. Our 
prairie hay turned out less than a third of a 
crop and our alfalfa only a little better than 
h^lf a crop. But notwithstanding this accumu- 
lation of calamities, we pushed back the im- 



THE GRAIN 9 

pndent face of famine, cheated the hot winds, 
and whipped the drouth to a standstill, with 
kafircorn." Referring to the influence of kafir- 
corn upon the fortunes of his community, Mr. 
Adams said: *^In 1896, half of the upland por- 
tion of our county was owned by eastern in- 
vestors, fire insurance and loan companies, the 
titles having been secured by that peculiar in- 
vestment process known as mortgage foreclos- 
ures. Uplands that had formerly been consid- 
ered worth from $15 to $25 per acre were of- 
fered without buyers at from $3 to $8 per acre. 
These lands, now selling at from $30 to $50 per 
acre, have been bought back by our farmers and 
most of them paid for with kafircorn." 

10. The cash returns from kafircorn and corn 
through a series of years show kafircorn 's true 
place among the crops grown upon the farms of 
the Central Southwest. 

The Kansas State Board of Agriculture issues 
annual reports based upon assessors' returns 
showing the acreage and value of every crop 
grown. The following statement of the cash 
value of kafircorn and corn for the past eleven 
years was compiled from these published re- 
ports. A careful study of it is commended to 
those who repeat the statement that Indian 
corn yields more than kafircorn, and who in 
other ways display their entire lack of knowl- 
edge of what they are talking about. 



10 SUEE FEED CROPS 

Value per acre. 

Kafircorn Corn 

1901 $ 10.32 $ 3.23 

1902 12.69 11.20 

1903 9,30 8.74 

1904 9.72 7.81 

1905 9.94 10.11 

1906 9.18 9.89 

1907 11.13 9.25 

1908 10.88 11.70 

1909 11.23 10.77 

1910 12.92 8.89 

1911 15.72 7.68 

Total, 11 years .... $123 . 03 $99 . 27 

Average $ 11.18 $ 9.02 

In Kansas, the average cash return from an 
acre of kafircorn during the past eleven years 
was 23.94 percent, greater than from an acre of 
corn. The figures are based on the total acre- 
age planted to these crops during that period. 

Corn turned off more money than kafircorn in 
but three years out of the eleven, and in each 
case the difference per acre was less than a 
dollar. 

In 1901, the value of kafircorn per acre was 
more than three times the value of corn. In 
1911, an acre of kafircorn brought more than 
twice as much money as an acre of corn. 

It is not likely that the best land was planted 



THE GRAIN 11 

to kafircorn, or that it had as good cultivation 
as corn. 

11. Many landowners positively prohibit the 

planting of kafircorn on their land. Others en- 
courage it. One farm loan company, which has 
been in business in Kansas since 1881, and in 
Oklahoma since 1889, has adopted the following 
plan: ^'We have for three years been refusing 
to lease land under our charge to a tenant who 
will not put at least one-half of the land, in- 
tended for corn, to kafircorn, the blackhull 
white variety being preferred. On one farm 
in Kay county. Central Oklahoma, the tenant 
had in 1911,. 120 acres of Indian corn which 
made thirty bushels to the acre. On this same 
farm were 100 acres of kafircorn which made 
sixty bushels per acre. The land is of the same 
quality. The old idea that kafircorn ruins the 
land is passing away. If kafircorn is planted 
reasonably early, the grain harvested and the 
stalks plowed under while green, the land will 
be enriched. We write it in the lease that the 
tenants shall plant as much kafircorn as they 
plant of Indian corn." 

12. Growing a crop of kafircorn is not diffi- 
cult. In general, the same methods of prepar- 
ing the soil, planting, and cultivating as are 
used in growing Indian corn should be followed. 
Kafircorn will produce a crop on any soil which 
will grow anything else ; the better the soil, the 
higher the yields. Hard land should be plowed 



12 SURE FEED CEOPS 

during the fall and winter and worked down to 
a firm seed bed. Flat planting gives better re- 
sults than listing on such soils. Very sandy 
soils should not be plowed. The lister should 
be used in the same manner as for planting 
com on such lands, but shallower. 

13. Blackhull white kafircorn is the standard 
variety. It has yielded more than others in 
practically all comparative tests. Seed of this 
variety has been selected and improved by the 
Kansas and Oklahoma Experiment Stations and 
by growers so that it is now possible to obtain 
first class seed for planting. Different varieties 
of kafircorn cross-pollenize just as do different 
varieties of corn. It is an advantage if all 
farmers in a given locality grow the same va- 
riety. The grade of the product to be marketed 
is lowered by a mixture of varieties, which al- 
ways bring lower prices than the pure article. 
A germination test of kafircorn seed should 
always be made before planting. "When stored 
in bulk, it heats readily. This injures the seed 
so that much of it may not germinate. Kafir- 
corn seed which has a musty odor or which 
sticks togther in lumps should not be used for 
planting. 

14. A warm soil is needed for the germination 
of kafircorn seed. It should not be planted until 
after the usual time of planting Indian corn. In 
Oklahoma, the highest average yields have been 
secured from plantings made from April 15th to 



THE GEAIN 13 

May 15th, though much kafircorn is planted as 
late as June. In regions where cotton is grown, 
kafircorn may be planted just before planting 
the cotton. Not less than four months from 
planting time until frost is desirable for the 
maturing of kafircorn. Five months is better, 
because in very dry weather, kafircorn waits 
and makes practically no progress toward ma- 
turity. 

15. The distance between plants has an im- 
portant bearing upon the yields of kafircorn. 
The rows should be not less than three and one- 
half feet apart. Where the average annual 
rainfall exceeds forty inches, single plants 
should be about four inches apart. The dis- 
tance between plants should gradually be in- 
creased as the average annual rainfall dimin- 
ishes until they are a foot apart in regions with 
less than twenty-five inches of rain. Planters 
should be adjusted so that single grains are 
dropped at the proper distances. The tendency 
IS to plant kafircorn too thickly, probably be- 
cause most planters are equipped with ^'cane^' 
plates. Blank plates should be obtained and 
drilled especially for kafircorn. From two to 
^ve pounds of kafircorn seed will plant an acre, 
varying with the distance apart at which the 
grains are dropped. 

16. The cultivation of kafircorn should be the 
same as that given Indian corn. Because of the 
fact that kafircorn withstands drouth, many 



14 SUEE FEED CEOPS 

fail to give it the care and cultivation which it 
must have to produce maximum yields. The 
plant is smaller and weaker than Indian corn 
when it first comes up. The first cultivations 
may be given with the harrow, followed by 
whatever implements are available. Late culti- 
vation should be shallow so as not to disturb 
the extensive root system of the kafircorn, 
which fills the soil more completely than the 
root system of Indian corn. The harrow culti- 
vator with fourteen teeth, or a mower wheel 
dragged between the rows will do satisfactory 
work. No crust should be permitted to form on 
the surface of the soil until after the grain is 
practically mature. 

17. The harvesting of kafircorn presents some 
difficulties to those unaccustomed to the crop. 
With experience, these are quickly overcome 
and, with proper equipment, the work of har- 
vesting kafircorn can be done more quickly and 
cheaply than can the husking of Indian corn. 
The stalk and leaves of kafircorn remain green 
long after the grain is mature, and usually until 
cut or killed bv frost. The general custom in 
Butler county, Kansas, is to wait until the kafir- 
corn has had a light frost. It is then cut with 
a corn binder and shocked. After curing in the 
shock for several weeks, the bundles are headed 
by a knife attached to a wagon box, (19) and 
the fodder is reshocked. The heads are stacked 
like headed wheat, a layer of hay or straw being 
first placed on the ground to protect them. 



THE GRAIN 15 

The threshing is done at convenient times dur- 
ing the winter. 

18. In the Texas Panhandle, with its dry 
climate, the following method, described by a 
Swisher county farmer, is in general use: 
^^When the grain is to be threshed, either for 
the market or to be ground and fed, we use an 
ordinary grain header of any of the standard 
makes. We allow the grain to mature thor- 
oughly and prefer, if possible, to have one or 
two good frosts before cutting. Handled in this 
way, the grain should not be put in too large 
ricks on account of danger of heating. With 
one man to run the header, two men to run the 
header wagons, and one or two extra men to 
help unload, from twenty-five to thirty-five 
acres per day can be harvested. This method 
puts the heads in the ricks ready to be threshed 
at one handling." There is also a kafircorn 
header which is bolted to the side of a wagon 
box and does good work where the heads are 
produced at a uniform height. 

19. Bound kafircorn can be headed more 
cheaply than corn can be husked. A farmer in 
Custer county. Western Oklahoma, gives the 
following description of his plan: ^^I use a 
knife made out of an old sixteen-inch plow lay. 
The landside piece should be taken off and the 
lay sharpened and straightened. Then have a 
hole drilled in the point, about an inch from the 
end. Bolt a piece of pipe ^ve or six feet long 



16 SUEE FEED CEOPS 

to the side of the lay for a handle. Get a flat 
piece of iron a little longer than the lay. Have 
holes drilled in each end. Bore two holes 
through the sideboard of the wagon box to 
match this iron, about an inch from the top. 
Put the knife in the inside of the wagon box, 
then the front end of the piece of iron, and bolt 
it. Put a couple of washers between the iron 
and the wagon box at the back end and bolt it. 
Keep the knife sharp with a file. If possible, 
put your box on a wagon with low wheels and 
put on double sideboards. One man can cut off 
the heads as fast as two can place them under 
the knife. The bundles can then be reshocked 
very quickly." 

20. Heading kafircorn by hand is entirely 
practicable where only limited acreages are 
grown. A well balanced butcher knife or a 
very short bladed cane knife should be used and 
the heads should be cut off with as short a 
shank as possible, so as to hasten curing. Some 
leave the heads in small piles in the field for a 
few days before stacking; others place the heads 
in long ricks, eight to ten feet wide, direct from 
the wagons after first putting down a layer of 
stalks to keep the heads from the ground. 
Covers should be provided for use in case rain 
should come before the stack is completed and 
to protect the finished stack. If these are not 
at hand, the stack of kafircorn heads should be 
topped out with some material which will turn 
water. Kafircorn heads may also be stored in 



THE GRAIN 17 

roofed cribs, such as are used for storing Indian 
corn. 

21. Kafircorn is threshed with the regular 
machines used for threshing wheat and oats. 
Small threshers with gasoline engine on the 
same truck are coming into general use in West- 
ern Oklahoma and are especially adapted to 
rough localities with poor roads. For use on 
the farm, it is not necessary in most cases that 
all of a crop of kafircorn be threshed. It is cus- 
tomary for the producer to do the threshing 
and it is well to delay this work until winter, 
when it may be done more cheaply, and the 
threshed grain will not heat so readily when 
stored. Ventilation from the bottom should al- 
ways be provided in bins where threshed kafir- 
corn is to be stored. Make one ventilator for 
each four feet of length of bin, extending across 
the bin and through the wall on each side, and 
raised about one inch from the floor. ^ Two 
pieces of one by four lumber, spaced six inches 
apart with blocks of wood and covered on the 
two open sides with galvanized screen wire and 
open to the outside air at the ends, make good 
ventilators. 

22. Concerning markets for kafircorn, H. M. 

Cottrell, Agricultural Commissioner of the Rock 
Island Lines, after extended inquiry among the 
largest buyers of grain in Chicago, made the 
following statement : ' ^ Kafircorn and milomaize 
are worth ninety percent, as much as the same 



18 SUEE FEED CEOPS 

weight of corn for feeding work horses, beef 
and dairy cattle, hogs and sheep. The limited 
supply on the markets and the strong demand 
for these grains for poultry feeds has kept the 
price at or above that of corn. This has made 
it impossible for stockmen to buy these grains 
for the regular feeding and fattening of live- 
stock. A number of grain men have been con- 
sulted and every man stated that whenever the 
supply of kafircorn and milomaize became so 
large that it assumed an important place in the 
markets, it would be absorbed just the same as 
corn, oats, barley, and other feeds, selling at a 
price compared with the price for other grains 
proportionate to its feed value." To reach the 
markets, enough must be grown close to a ship- 
ping point to make it to someone's interest to 
buy and ship. There may have been no cash 
markets for single loads of kafircorn. But a 
thousand or ten thousand loads will find a ready 
market, no matter what the size of the corn 
crop. Kafircorn is usually quoted on the markets 
by the hundred weight instead of the bushel of 
fifty-six pounds. From seventy-five to eighty 
pounds of kafircorn heads, if well cured, will 
thresh out fifty-six pounds of grain. 

23. Methods of feeding kafircorn differ but 
little from the best methods of feeding Indian 
corn. Kafircorn must be ground to obtain its 
full feeding value. In digestion experiments 
conducted by the writer at the Oklahoma Ex- 
periment Station in 1897- '98, two-thirds of the 



THE GEAIN 19 

weight of whole kafircorn fed to steers was re- 
covered from the dung, practically unaffected 
by the digestive juices. It is true that hogs 
following steers fed whole kafircorn will put 
most of it to good use, but steers being fattened 
should be at more profitable work than pre- 
digesting kafircorn for hogs. Coarsely ground 
kafircorn contains 5.79 percent, digestible pro- 
tein and 56.54 percent, digestible carbohydrates 
and fat. Average corn meal contains 6.13 per- 
cent, digestible protein and 74.36 percent, di- 
gestible carbohydrates and fat. Average 
analyses of kafircorn show that it contains a 
total of 11.2 percent, protein and 3.1 percent, 
fat; Indian corn contains a total of 10.4 per- 
cent, protein and 5.0 percent, fat. 

24. For horses, kafircorn heads may entirely 
take the place of corn. The heads may be fed 
without grinding, but the feed is improved by 
running the heads through feed cutters which 
will cut them into quarter to half-inch pieces. 
The ration is improved by the addition of a 
limited amount of bran, shorts, or cottonseed 
meal, but this is not necessary if the horses have 
alfalfa, cowpea, or peanut hay. (81) It is de- 
sirable, however, when prairie hay is fed. 

25. As feed for calves, kafircorn meal fed dry 
has been shown by the Kansas Experiment 
Station to be well suited to feed with skimmilk. 
Kafircorn meal has a tendency to constipate 



20 SUEE FEED CROPS 

animals to which it is fed and this overcomes 
the scouring effect of the skimmilk. 

26. For fattening steers, ground kafircorn 
may entirely take the place of Indian corn. Ex- 
cellent results have been obtained when ground 
kafircorn was fed with enough alfalfa hay or 
cottonseed meal to balance the ration. The re- 
sults are not as satisfactory when ground kafir- 
corn is fed alone and kafir or corn stover, 
prairie or sorghum hay, is used for rough feed. 
Comparisons of corn meal and kafircorn meal 
made at the Kansas Experiment Station, where 
some alfalfa hay was fed, showed ground kafir- 
corn to be worth only 7 percent, less than ground 
corn for fattening steers. Beginning in 1899, 
the Oklahoma Experiment Station made a series 
of feeding experiments to ascertain the com- 
parative value of corn meal, kafir meal, alfalfa 
hay, and kafir stover as beef producers. The 
trials were repeated three times. In the last 
year of the experiment, corn meal and alfalfa 
hay produced an average daily gain per steer 
of 2.39 pounds. Each pound of gain required 
seven pounds of corn and six pounds of alfalfa 
hay. The steers fed ground kafircorn and al- 
falfa hay made a daily gain of 2.36 pounds each 
and each pound of gain required seven and one- 
third pounds of grain and six and one-half 
pounds of alfalfa hay. 

27. Fed to dairy cows, kafircorn should al- 
ways be ground and it is especially important 



THE GRAIN 21 

that sometliing be fed to balance the ration and 
overcome the constipating tendency of the kafir- 
corn. Alfalfa, cowpea, or peanut hay is excel- 
lent for this purpose and when they are on 
hand, no feed need be purchased. If ordinary 
roughness is fed, the grain ration should con- 
sist of two-thirds ground kafircorn and one- 
third bran or shorts; or three-fourths ground 
kafircorn and one-fourth cottonseed meal. It is 
wasteful to feed unground kafircorn to cattle 
of any sort, and especially to dairy cows. The 
grain need not be threshed before grinding. 
Ordinary sweep mills, with proper attachments, 
will grind kafircorn heads just as they grind 
corn. Ground kafircorn heads are entirely satis- 
factory for all classes of cattle, but the ration 
should always be balanced with alfalfa, cowpea, 
or peanut hay, or cottonseed meal. 

28. Growing pigs should be fed alfalfa, cow- 
pea, or peanut hay, or shorts in addition to 
kafircorn heads, or ground kafircorn, which 
should be moistened before feeding. Kafircorn 
heads should be fed on a slightly sloping floor 
so that the refuse will be worked to one side. 
As an exclusive ration, kafircorn will not take 
the place of corn in pig feeding. Kafircorn con- 
tains less oil than corn, and pigs fed exclusively 
on ground kafircorn quickly become constipated 
and get out of condition. This trouble may be 
entirely avoided by balancing the ration with 
home-grown feeds which are rich in protein. 
(150, 172, 184.) 



22 SURE FEED CROPS 

29. For fattening hogs, ground kafircom or 
ground kafircorn heads may practically take 
the place of corn, though the addition of some- 
thing to balance the ration is desirable and 
profitable. There is nothing better than alfalfa, 
cowpea, or peanut hay for this purpose. There 
is less waste if the hay is cut into short lengths 
before feeding, but the cheapest gains will come 
from feeding the hay in low racks where the 
hogs can get at it without wasting it. At the 
Oklahoma Experiment Station, one lot of 115 
pound shoats was fed what cowpea hay the pigs 
would eat in addition to a mixture of one-half 
kafircorn meal and one-half corn meal. They 
consumed four and three-fourths pounds of 
grain for each pound of gain. Another lot fed 
the same kind of grain but no cowpea hay con- 
sumed eight and one-fifth pounds of grain for 
each pound of gain. The lot receiving cowpea 
hay had better appetites, ate more grain, and 
made much better gains than the lot which did 
not receive cowpea hay. 

If none of these hays is to be had, cottonseed 
meal, if judiciously fed, may profitably be used. 
Five pounds per day of ground kafircorn heads 
with one-half to one pound of cottonseed meal 
will make a good ration for a hundred-pound 
hog. In a trial at the Oklahoma Experiment 
Station, pigs fed a ration of four-fifths ground 
kafircorn and one-fifth cottonseed meal made a 
daily gain of 1.28 lbs. each, using 3.19 lbs. of 
grain costing 1.72 cents to produce a pound of 



THE GEAIN 23 

gain. At the same time, other pigs fed a ration 
of one-half ground kafircorn and one-half corn 
meal made a daily gain of 1.04 lbs. each, using 
5.71 lbs. of grain costing 2.55 cents for each 
pound of gain. (84.) 

^ 30. As poultry feed, no single grain is supe- 
rior to kafircorn. It need not be ground, except 
for chicks. It does not tend to fatten hens 
rapidly as corn does and consequently is a 
better egg-producer. Much of the kafircorn 
which is marketed is used in the preparation of 
poultry feed and its use for this purpose is 
rapidly increasing. 

31. Kafircorn makes good silage. 0. E. Reed 
of the dairy department of the Kansas Agricul- 
tural College says: "For silage, kafircorn is 
better than cane but not as good as corn. Kafir- 
corn ranks between the two in food value, acre- 
age yield, and effect on the soil. Its special 
advantages over corn are that it is more drouth- 
resisting and yields higher. It generally yields 
about seven tons to the acre. ' ' Other points in 
kafircorn 's favor are: it is practically certain to 
produce a crop of grain and forage, com may 
not do so in very dry seasons; the plant remains 
green long after the grain is mature, thus giv- 
ing a longer time during which the silo may 
be filled; the corn plant dies quickly after the 
ear is formed; kafircorn is more conveniently 
handled by corn binders and ensilage cutters. 

32. Kafircorn smut sometimes reduces the 



24 SURE FEED CROPS 

yields. It is differenf from corn smut and may 
be prevented by treating the seed with a solu- 
tion composed of one pound of formaldehyde to 
thirty gallons of water. With this strength of 
solution, the seed should be soaked for one hour 
and then dried. It takes about four and one- 
half gallons of this solution to treat one bushel 
of seed and the treatment costs about five cents 
per bushel. At the Kansas Experiment Station, 
untreated seed produced about thirty percent, 
of smutted heads while treated seed produced 
no smut whatever. 

33. Kafircorn blight is popularly supposed to 
be caused by rain washing the pollen from the 
heads while in bloom. The Bureau of Plant 
Industry, U. S. Department of Agriculture, has 
recently reported the results of investigation of 
grain-sorghum production in the San Antonio 
region of Texas. The results indicate that the 
blasting of heads of kafircorn is due to the work 
of the sorghum midge instead of to rains while 
the plants are in bloom. The experiments also 
showed that when kafircorn is planted early, it 
has a much better chance of escaping this 
trouble than if planted late. Relatively little 
loss has been caused by blight of kafircorn, 
especially where it is treated as a real crop 
instead of an afterthought. 

34. Kafircorn seed may be selected and im- 
proved more easily than can seed corn. The 
entire plant, including the head, may be taken 



THE GEAIN 25 

into accouDt when selecting kafircorn seed. 
Plump, well-filled heads, borne by sturdy stalks 
of uniform height should be selected after the 
crop is fully matured. These should be hung 
up in a dry and well-ventilated place and the 
grain should be left on the heads until just 
before planting time. Tall stalks which appear 
in the field should be removed before they 
bloom. These show a mixture with broom corn, 
sorghum, milo, and other related varieties and 
are even more undesirable than a mixture of 
grains of different colors in Indian corn. The 
Oklahoma Experiment Station, by continued 
selection, developed a strain of blackhull white 
kafircorn having much larger grain than the 
kind usually grown, and still retaining all of 
the other desirable characters of the crop. Many 
farmers have also, by continued selection, 
worked similar improvements in the kafircorn 
which they grow. 

35. "Kafircorn ruins the land'' is probably 
the most frequently offered excuse for not grow- 
ing kafircorn. Many farmers who carefully 
located their feed lots and barns near the head 
of a draw, so that a heavy rain will haul out the 
manure, say that they will not plant kafircorn 
''because it will ruin the land." When urged to 
plant kafircorn, they seem suddenly to become 
much concerned about maintaining the fertility 
of their soils. Recent analyses published by the 
Oklahoma Experiment Station show that a crop 
of thirty bushels of kafircorn removes from the 



26 SURE FEED CROPS 

soil 32.9 lbs, nitrogen, 6.5 lbs. potash, and 10.4 
lbs. phosphoric acid ; a crop of thirty bushels of 
corn removes 30.7 lbs. nitrogen, 6.8 lbs. potash, 
and 11.0 lbs. phosphoric acid. The differences 
are so slight that they amount to nothing. But 
since in 1911, kafircorn on the farm of the Okla- 
homa Experiment Station yielded fifty-six 
bushels per acre while Indian corn alongside 
yielded nothing, there is no question in this 
instance about kafircorn removing more of the 
elements of plant-food than Indian corn did. 

36. Kafircorn dries out the soil because of its 
extensive root system and the fact that it con- 
tinues growing until killed by frost. Corn dies 
while kafircorn still finds enough moisture in 
the soil to keep it in good condition for growth 
when rains come. Corn is dead in August or 
September and quits taking moisture from the 
soil. Kafircorn keeps on growing until killed by 
a freeze and usually leaves the soil very dry in 
November. Land which grew kafircorn, imless 
it is sandy, should all be plowed before Christ- 
mas. The effect of the thorough drying of the 
soil can be overcome by turning the land over 
and giving the frosts of winter a chance to 
break it up so that it may absorb and hold the 
rain which falls. Many farmers in Butler 
county, Kansas, insist that kafircorn actually 
improves the soil. There are fields on which 
kafircorn has followed kafircorn for fifteen years 
without any reduction of yield. But on this 
land, the kafircorn is headed high and the fodder 



THE GEAIN 27 

is turned under early in the winter. The de- 
cayed vegetable matter has improved the phy- 
sical condition of the soil so that the removal 
of the plant food by the successive crops of 
grain has not yet been noticed on the yields. 
Kafircorn should be rotated with other crops, 
such as oats, cowpeas, peanuts, and cotton. 
With proper attention given to early and thor- 
ough preparation of land which has grown a 
crop of kafircorn, its fancied ill effects upon the 
soil fertility will disappear. 

37. Actual experience in the growing of any 
crop under the varying conditions of farm prac- 
tice finally determines its place in a system of 
farming. Kafircorn is actually being grown, 
marketed, and fed with profit by many thou- 
sands of farmers in the Central Southwest. 
Brief statements from a few of them, relating 
their experiences in 1911, follow: 

^ 38. Washita County, Western Oklahoma. ''I 

have been planting kafircorn for three years and 
expect to continue planting it and to increase 
the acreage each year. I have my barn full 
of kafircorn heads now and it looks good to 
me.'' 

^*^I have lived here eleven years and have 
tried all of this time to grow Indian corn. Made 
two good crops of corn, three short crops, from 
ten to twenty bushels per acre, mostly trash and 
smut, and six complete failures. In all of these 
eleven years, I have never seen a failure of 



28 SUEE FEED CROPS 

kafircorn. It has always produced a crop, wher- 
ever it had any show at all, and I have never 
seen any kind of a crop respond more readily to 
good land and good cultivation than kafircorn 
does." 

39. Custer County, Western Oklahoma. ''I 
have been in the state only since December 1, 
1909, and got my lesson with Indian corn the 
first year. If it had not been for about twenty 
acres of kafircorn which I planted that year, I 
could not have pulled through. One acre of my 
kafircorn made more than all my crop of corn. 
In 1911, 1 had fifty-seven acres of kafircorn and 
milomaize and, regardless of the extreme drouth 
and torrid winds, it made good yields. I am 
billed for kafircorn, milomaize, cowpeas, and 
alfalfa and, unless my wife does the planting, 
we will not have a patch of roasting ears. The 
old-timers here call me a 'kafircorn wooly' and 
I am proud of the name. ' ' 

40. Kiowa County, Western Oklahoma. '*I 

planted some kafircorn in April and May, 1911. 
In July, after it began raining, I planted two 
hundred acres more to kafircorn and milomaize. 
It made so much feed that I had to come to the 
Oklahoma City stockyards to buy steers to eat 
it. They weighed 700 lbs. and cost me $4.48 
in October. They were fed this kafir and milo 
with just enough alfalfa and cottonseed cake to 
provide lubrication. On March 19, 1912, they 
weighed 1060 lbs. at the Oklahoma City stock- 



THE GRAIN 29 

yards and sold for $6.25, topping the market for 
that weight. I'll have to grow kafircorn for a 
few years before I can afford to make any more 
attempts to prove that I live in a * great corn 
country'. After this, my corn acreage will be 
limited to a roasting ear patch." 

'*In 1911 from fifty-five acres of sod kafircorn, 
I raised 1590 bushels of threshed grain. All the 
attention this had was to break the sod about 
three inches deep in March, and in April to 
plant three and one-half bushels of kafircorn 
with an ordinary two-horse planter. It was cut 
in September with a corn binder. The total 
expense of planting, cutting, and shocking was 
$104.50. Figure the crop of 1590 bushels at 
sixty cents, $954. Deducting $75 for threshing 
and $104.50 for other expenses leaves a net re- 
turn of $774.50 and enough roughness out of the 
stalks to last a natural lifetime. ' ' 

41. Woods County, Western Oklahoma. ''I 

have finally got around to the conclusion that 
kafircorn is the only grain for this part of Okla- 
homa. As long as I remain sane and live here, 
I shall waste but little time on corn. It is hard 
to give up, but these hot winds are too much 
for it. Even moisture and the best of cultiva- 
,tion are no guarantee of a crop of corn." 

42. Dewey County, Western Oklahoma. ''I 

had fifteen acres of kafircorn in 1911 which 
made twenty-five bushels per acre. Thirty acres 
of corn in the same field made about six bushels 



30 SUEE FEED CEOPS 

per acre. I shall put out another fifteen acre 
* accident insurance policy' of kafircom each 
year hereafter.'' 

43. Texas County, Western Oklahoma. **To 

satisfy my curiosity, I measured out one bushel 
of kafircom and kept it before my chickens 
until consumed. During the period, exactly one 
week, twenty-three laying hens laid eighty-one 
eggs, worth eighty-one cents on the market. 
That looks good, considering that the top price 
paid for kafircom here this year has been sixty- 
two cents. But there were also twenty-eight 
early hatched pullets that helped consume the 
kafircom. Most of them had recently been 
bought and were not used to grain except what 
they rustled from a milomaize field. The pul- 
lets must have also added considerable weight 
to their poor frames; at any rate, they con- 
sumed much of the grain." 

44. Woodward County, Western Oklahoma. 

**I have raised kafircom for eleven years and 
have always found a market for all I had to 
spare. Kafircom surely gave this country a 
lift in 1911. There was a large acreage, on 
account of the failure of wheat, and the yields 
were from thirty to fifty bushels per acre. I 
raised about 1600 bushels." 

45. Kay County, Central Oklahoma. *'You 
advised planting ten acres of kafircom. Why 
did you not say one hundred? Kafircom has 
never failed since I have been here. An aver- 



THE GRAIN 31 

age acre of kafircorn will make more beef or 
pork in Oklahoma than an average acre of 
corn will in the north. And it will make five 
to ten times as many eggs.*' 

46. Pawnee County, Central Oklahoma. 

** Where kafircorn and milomaize were planted 
at the right time in 1911, they made good yields. 
My own made from sixty to seventy-five bushels 
per acre. Corn in the same field did not make 
over two bushels per acre.'' 

47. Lincoln County, Central Oklahoma. ''I 
plant plenty of other stuff for feed so that I 
will not need the kafircorn stalks. As soon as 
the heads are ripe, I cut them off with a tree 
pruner. As soon as I am through heading, I 
plow the green stalks under good and deep. I 
first tried this on a five-acre piece which I con- 
sidered the poorest spot on the farm, but it 
made forty bushels of Indian corn to the acre 
the next year. If it had not been for kafircorn 
in 1911, 1 would have been compelled to dispose 
of all my pure-bred Berkshire hogs, but I have 
been able to keep the best of them." 

48. Kingfisher County, Central Oklahoma. ^*I 
have been in Oklahoma three years; came from 
Canada. I have been trying to raise corn but 
have not been very successful. I had one hun- 
dred and thirty acres the first year and it aver- 
aged about four bushels; the next year fifty 
acres which averaged about eight bushels; sixty 



32 SURE FEED CROPS 

acres in 1911 and it made a total crop of about 
sixty bushels. I have three hundred acres for 
crops in 1912, and will have one hundred and 
forty acres of wheat, twenty-five of oats, ten 
of cotton, fifteen of corn, and the rest in kaiir- 
corn. There will not be much corn for me after 
this." 

49. Osage County, Central Oklahoma. **When 
the dry weather came on in 1911, we saw that 
we were going to lose the corn crop. I relisted 
the ground and planted one hundred and fifty 
acres to kafircorn. This made an average of 
forty bushels per acre and was sold for fifty 
cents a bushel. You can see that hereafter, 
kafircorn will always be good enough for me." 

50. Murray County, Eastern Oklahoma. '*We 

never had much experience with kafircorn or 
milomaize until in 1911 when we got all kinds 
of experience. Much of the corn and stubble 
land was planted at different dates, ranging 
from May 20 to August 20. Kafircorn planted 
in May yielded about twenty bushels per acre. 
Milomaize didn't yield as much grain as kafir- 
corn and made much less fodder. Com was a 
complete failure." 

51. Johnston County, Eastern Oklahoma. 

**Last spring I asked you about planting kafir- 
corn and milomaize and you gave me what I've 
found to be facts. I told you then that I in- 
tended to plant thirty acres of kafircorn and am 



THE GRAIN 33 

kicking myself for not doing it. I planted only 
twelve acres and it made good." 

52. LeFlore County, Eastern Oklahoma. *'I 
planted five acres of kafircorn on oats stubble 
and it was fine; tbin land too. I got more from 
it than from three crops of oats.'' 

MILOMAIZE 

53. The value of milomaize and its final place 
among the crops grown in regions of limited 
and variable rainfall have not been determined 
as fully as for kafircorn. The crop is of more 
recent introduction, having first been grown in 
the United States about 1885. Many farmers 
in the Central Southwest got their first experi- 
ence with both kafircorn and milomaize in the 
very dry season of 1911. After all else had 
failed, these crops were planted in July and 
early August. It is but natural that many 
should use the comparative returns from these 
crops, planted late and under unfavorable con- 
ditions, as a basis for determining which crop 
to plant on at least a portion of the land usually 
planted to corn. Because late planted milo- 
maize generally matured more grain than kafir- 
corn planted on the same dates, many jumped to 
the conclusion that milomaize is a more satis- 
factory crop than kafircorn. 

54. Both crops have their place and the writer 
has given much attention to determining the 



34 SURE FEED CROPS 

conditions under wHch one is to be preferred to 
the other. For fifteen years, and especially 
throughout the season of 1911, information 
bearing upon this has been gathered by cor- 
respondence and personal investigation. In the 
fall of 1911, the entire matter was gone over 
with W. D. Bentley, G. L. Bishop, and F. F. 
Ferguson, agents of the farmers' co-operative 
demonstration work of the U. S. Department 
of Agriculture, who travel constantly over 
Oklahoma, inspecting the work of county 
agents and visiting farmers who are striving 
to improve their methods. 

55. The grain crop to replace all or a portion 
of the corn, if it is to attain much importance, 
must be planted at about the same time that 
com is usually planted. There is an interval 
of about a month between the time corn and 
cotton are planted, approximately April 15 to 
May 15 in Oklahoma. Planted between these 
dates, kafircorn is more resistant to drouth than 
milomaize. In 1911, early planted kafircorn 
generally matured a good crop while much of 
the milomaize planted at the same time died. 
Many instances were reported where milomaize 
heads had blasted in the boot, like com tassels, 
while kafircorn merely stopped growing and 
waited for rain. 

56. Harvesting with machinery is necessary 
in order that any grain crop may become of 
commercial importance. Kafircorn may be 



THE GRAIN 35 

harvested with machinery in common use, such 
as wheat binders, headers and header binders, 
wagon box kafircorn headers, and corn har- 
vesters. Milomaize, even under the best con- 
ditions, is not easily harvested by machinery 
and if planted early, is usually very difficult to 
gather. A close examination of fields of these 
two crops will make this difference very clear. 
Very few men would choose the job of harvest- 
ing one hundred acres of milomaize instead of 
a like acreage of kafircorn. And these few 
wouldn't do it again. 

57. Milomaize matures grain in a shorter 
time than is required by kafircorn. This char- 
acteristic makes it more desirable than kafir- 
co-m for regions with high altitude and short 
growing seasons. Where the average annual 
rainfall is less than twenty-five inches, milo- 
maize is preferred as a grain crop. In those 
localities, the crop is usually planted in June. 
If planted earlier, milomaize will furnish early 
grain feed for hogging down. "Where the aver- 
age annual rainfall is between twenty-five and 
forty inches, milomaize may be planted on 
wheat or oats stubble immediately after har- 
vest. Kafircorn resists the work of chinch bugs 
better than milomaize and if the bugs are pres- 
ent in the stubble, the former is safer, even for 
late planting. 

58. Dwarf yellow milomaize is the variety 
most generally grown. It generally yields fully 



36 SURE FEED CROPS 

as much and is harvested more easily than the 
standard yellow variety. Careful selection of 
seed is required to maintain the dwarf habit. 
The number of stalks bearing the head erect 
instead of on a crooked shank may also be in- 
creased by planting seed from erect heads or 
by close planting. A white variety of milomaize 
is also grown to a limited extent but its value 
in comparison with the yellow variety has not 
been determined. A farmer in Beckham county, 
Western Oklahoma, reported: **I had two 
plats planted to white milomaize last year and 
they made forty-one bushels per acre. Some 
kafircorn and yellow milomaize were also raised 
and they made good yields. The men who raised 
them have plenty of feed and are selling it to 
those who raise cotton and plant corn." 

59. A uniform product is more desirable if 
the grain is to be put on the market. If dif- 
ferent farmers on the same day offer to the 
buyer one load of blackhull white kafircorn, one 
load of red kafircorn, one load of yellow milo- 
maize, one load of white milomaize, one load of 
"fodderinktum," one load of ^^buncoita," and 
several loads of miscellaneous mixtures and 
crosses of these with each other and with broom 
corn and different varieties of sweet sorghum, 
the market is apt to go off. This can be shipped 
only as mixed stuff, no grade, and will bring 
low prices in comparison with what would have 
been obtained if full cars of either blackhull 



THE GRAIN 37 

white kafircorn, or of yellow milomaize had 
been shipped. 

60. Methods of growing milomaize differ but 
little from those used in growing kafircorn. 
(12-16) Thorough and early preparation of the 
soil and killing the weeds before planting pays 
well. If the crop is to be planted after wheat 
or oats are harvested, the stubble should be 
disked as the crop is cut. As soon as possible, 
milomaize should be planted in shallow lister 
furrows at about the same distance between 
plants as for kafircorn. (15) Frequent, shal- 
low cultivations should be given until the crop 
is well along toward maturity. 

61. When a corn crop fails completely, as it 
did over much of Oklahoma in 1911, milomaize 
may yet produce good yields of grain. A 
farmer in Tulsa county, Eastern Oklahoma, re- 
ported: '^I have a good bottom farm; raised 
from fifty to sixty-five bushels of com to the 
acre with the exception of 1901 and 1911. I 
made twenty-five bushels per acre in 1901 and 
the hot winds cooked one hundred and twenty 
acres for me in 1911. I cut the corn off of 
forty acres and disked the land good. On July 
19, I began planting milomaize. It came up 
and grew fine ; cultivated it three times. When 
the seed began hardening, we cut and shocked 
twenty acres; we headed the other twenty 
acres and it made better than fifty bushels per 
acre. The eighty acres of corn left made from 



38 SURE FEED CROPS 

three to twenty bushfels per acre on better land. ' ' 
But July cannot always be depended upon to 
have sufficient rainfall to make this practicable 
every season. 

62. Harvesting milomaize is usually done by 
cutting the heads off by hand. The irregular 
height of the stalks and their tendency to sprawl 
around, and the crooked stem on which the 
head is borne, make heading by machinery dif- 
ficult. But milomaize may be headed as cheaply 
as com can be husked. Since the fodder of 
milomaize is of but little value, heading is 
usually put off until after frost. The heads are 
thus fully matured and cure out readily, though 
it is well to take the same precautions as with 
kafircorn to prevent heating. (20-21.) 

63. Markets for milomaize are becoming es- 
tablished, the same as for kafircorn. But the 
best market for both of these crops is livestock 
to consume them on the farm which produced 
them. Milomaize may be threshed with the 
usual machinery and the methods are in gen- 
eral the same as for kafircorn. (21.) 

64. For feeding, milomaize has about the same 
value as kafircorn. It has not been studied so 
fully by the experiment staions but there is a 
large accumulation of the results of practical 
experience. Average analyses show that milo- 
maize contains 10.7 percent, protein and 2.8 
percent, fat. (23) The grains being larger 



THE GRAIN 39 

;fchan kafircorn, grinding is not so essential and 
this is one of the chief points of preference by 
those farmers who grow milomaize instead of 
kafircorn for feed for their own stock. While 
desirable, it is not so necessary that a ration of 
milomaize be balanced with other feeds, as is 
the case with kafircorn. (24-30) A Tulsa 
county. Eastern Oklahoma, farmer summed up 
his experience briefly: ^^ Milomaize is as good 
feed as corn to feed whole to horses and nearly 
as good as corn for hogs. For poultry it is the 
best feed that grows, but for cattle, it should be 
cracked. ' ' 

65. ** Horses doing heavy work should be 
given three feeds of milomaize a day, ' ' says H. 
M. Cottrell, Agricultural Commissioner, Rock 
Island Lines. ^^It is usually fed in the head, 
one-half more heads being given than would be 
fed of ears of com. Most teamsters prefer to 
feed milomaize in the head, cutting the stem off 
close. The main stem of the head and the many 
little stems with the seed attached force the 
horse to do a large amount of chewing before 
the grain can be swallowed, and this mastica- 
tion grinds the grain and mixes it with the 
saliva, increasing the proportion digested. 
Ground milomaize makes a good horse feed. 
Horses and mules have stood well hard^ work 
all summer, such as breaking prairie, with no 
grain but milomaize." 

66. Laxative feeds, rich in protein, such as 



40 SURE FEED CEOPS 

skimmilk, alfalfa, cowpeas, and peanut hays 
and cottonseed meal, add to the returns obtained 
from feeding milomaize, either whole or ground. 
Ground milomaize is excellent for feeding to 
skimmilk calves, the starch of the milomaize re- 
placing in feeding value the fat removed from 
the whole milk by skimming. It is not neces- 
sary to grind milomaize to be fed to hogs. For 
cattle, the grain may be fed in the head but re- 
turns will be better if the heads or the threshed 
grain are ground. 

67. Experience of growers and feeders of 
milomaize on the farms of the Central South- 
west is a reliable guide for others not accus- 
tomed to growing the crop. Conditions vary 
widely and general conclusions strictly ap- 
plicable to one locality may not entirely apply 
to others. For that reason, the location of the 
farmers making the report is given in what fol- 
lows: 

68. Kiowa County, Western Oklahoma. ''You 

requested us to report on the relative drouth- 
resistance of milomaize and kafircorn. I find 
that the latter stood the drouth of 1911 best. 
When the rains came on the fifth of July, the 
kafircorn was still standing and waiting to pro- 
duce a good crop while milomaize seemed too 
old to head well. These were planted the last 
days in April." 

69. Major County, Western Oklahoma. '*In 



THE GKAIN 41 

1912, 1 shall plant at least one hundred acres of 
kafircorn but no milomaize. I had both in 1911, 
but the milomaize isn't in it at all. I found that 
it was extra good for chinch bugs, while they 
didn't harm the kafircorn.'' 

70. Lincoln County, Central Oklahoma. '*In 

July, 1911, I planted all of my oats stubble and 
other idle land to milomaize. It all matured and 
made a good crop. If all farmers had done the 
same, there would have been enough feed for 
all of Oklahoma without shipping any in from 
other states." 

71. Beaver County, Western Oklahoma. **I 

have grown kafircorn from the time it was first 
known until I came here. It takes from one 
hundred and twenty to one hundred and fifty 
days for kafircorn to mature and only eighty- 
five days for milomaize. Kafircorn should be 
planted between the times for planting com and 
cotton, but milomaize should be planted later. 
To prepare the land for milomaize, I do nothing 
until the last probable snow of the season ; then 
I disk down the stubble and when we get a rain, 
list. After that, T disk and use the knife sled 
until the last of June. Then I list ^ and plant. 
I cut milomaize with a row binder in October, 
just before frost, and the stock eat all of it. 
I regard this plan with milomaize preferable to 
any plan with kafircorn west of the hundredth 
meridian. My method of handling the land is 
to keep all the snow, kill all the weeds, always 



42 SUEE FEED CROPS 

keep a good, deep mulch on the land (four 
inches is not too deep), and I do not plant until 
the soil gets warm, which at our elevation is the 
middle of June. 

72. Caddo County, Central Oklahoma. '*In 
1911, we had four plots of milomaize and kafir- 
corn. The first was plowed in April and flat 
planted in May; then the weather turned so dry 
that neither came up until June. One-half of 
the field was milomaize and the other half kafir- 
corn; both had the same cultivation, plowed 
four times and one hoeing. Milomaize grew 
very high and lodged in spots. Kafircorn stood 
up well and stood the drouth better; made forty 
bushels per acre ; clay soil. The second was all 
kafircorn; some of the land plowed early and 
the rest late in May. Weeds were two feet high 
and ground very dry when plowed. Early plow- 
ing made forty bushels per acre; late plowing 
thirty-five bushels; sandy soil. The third was 
one-half milomaize and the other half kafircorn ; 
listed in June; weeds were full grown; used 
log chain on lister to cover them. This was 
plowed six times. Milomaize made fifty bushels 
per acre; kafircorn thirty bushels; both stood 
up well, no difiPerence in drouth-resistance. 
Land was dark sandy. Milo grew very short, 
not near as tall as flat planted. The fourth 
field was plowed in May, weeds two feet high 
and ground very dry. Flat planted milomaize 
the latter part of May. Plowed four times, 



THE GRAIN 43 

made fifty bushels of heads per acre. It grew 
very tall but didn't lodge until late in the fall. 
This was sub-irrigated land on which com in 
the same field with the same attention made 
only ten bushels per acre. Our experience in 
feeding is that the stover of kafircom far ex- 
ceeds that of milomaize in value ; but for grain, 
milomaize is the best. Hogs will not eat kafir- 
corn when they can get milomaize, but poultry 
like kafircorn best. Both should be ground but 
not fed alone for best results; they should be 
balanced with other feeds.'' 

73. New varieties of non-saccharine sorghums 
are constantly being brought out by those who 
wish to make money out of the general disposi- 
tion of mankind to think that the fishing's better 
in the next hole. The value of kafircom and milo- 
maize has been determined by experiments and 
experience. Properly grown and fed, they are 
known to be profitable crops and much more 
certain than Indian corn to produce good yields 
under trying conditions. The farmer who is 
struggling against odds to establish a farm- 
stead will do well to let the U. S. Department 
of Agriculture and the experiment stations do 
the experimenting. Public funds are appro- 
priated for this purpose and all must pay a 
portion of the expense. Years of careful work 
are required to determine the probable com- 
mercial value of any crop and the individual 
farmer who constantly follows after the ^*new 



44 SURE FEED CROPS 

and wonderful ' ' rarely arrives at a condition of 
prosperity. Only one of these new varieties 
which have recently been exploited will be men- 
tioned : 

74. ''Desert wheat/* sometimes called 
''Egyptian wheat," ''Mexican wheat," or 
"wheat corn," is one of the "three much mis- 
represented sorghums" about which the U. S. 
Department of Agriculture has issued a 
Farmers' Bulletin. Of it, Professor A. M. Ten 
Eyck of Kansas said: "The tests of this crop 
at this station indicate that it is not so valuable 
as sorghum or kafircorn either for fodder or for 
grain. The yields of the grain have been less 
than the yields of kafircorn, and the crop is 
objectionable because the stems are usually very 
slender and the crop lodges badly and is hard 
to harvest. In my judgment, seedsmen are sell- 
ing it at a high price simply because it is a 
novelty, or not well known." 

COTTONSEED PRODUCTS 

75. Cottonseed is a sure feed crop not 

fully appreciated in any of the states which 
grow cotton. Oklahoma alone, in 1911, pro- 
duced more than 500,000 tons of cottonseed. 
But because of the tendency of the cotton crop 
to dominate and almost to drive out other lines 
of agriculture, resulting in very limited num- 
bers of livestock on farms which grow cotton, 



THE GEAIN 45 

most of this valuable feedstuff, in the form of 
cottonseed meal and cottonseed cake, was 
shipped to northern, eastern, and European 
feeders. This great economic waste is caused 
by the failure of cotton growers of the south- 
western states to grow the sure feed crops with 
which to make a properly balanced ration of 
cottonseed meal and thus obtain and retain the 
full value of the grain crop produced along with 
the lint of cotton. 

76. Cottonseed should be sold to the cotton oil 
mills and cottonseed meal should be bought 
back from the mills and fed, whenever prices 
bear their proper relation to actual feed values. 
Cottonseed oil has a much higher commercial 
value than feeding value and is present in ex- 
cessive amounts in cottonseed. The exchange 
value of cottonseed for cottonseed meal and 
the relative economy of feeding one or the other 
depends upon the kind of animal to be fed and 
the rough feed which is available. Approxi- 
mately, a ton of cottonseed has the same feed- 
ing value as twelve hundred and fifty pounds 
of cottonseed meal, but the actual returns ob- 
tained from feeding a ton of cottonseed may fall 
far below those secured from feeding twelve 
hundred and fifty pounds of cottonseed meal, 
properly balanced with kafircom, milomaize, or 
corn. 

77. A ton of cottonseed produces about 300 
pounds of oil, 800 pounds hulls, 750 pounds cot- 



46 SUEE FEED CROPS 

tonseed meal, 30 pounds linters, and 120 pounds 
waste and trash. The fertilizer constituents of 
a ton of cottonseed are 63 pounds nitrogen, 23 
pounds potash, and 25 pounds phosphoric acid, 
worth not less than $12.85 if bought in the form 
of commercial fertilizers. Cottonseed contains 
12.5 percent, digestible protein and 17.3 per- 
cent, digestible fat, and the difficulty in feeding 
cottonseed lies in properly balancing this ex- 
cessive amount of fat. 

^ 78. Cottonseed meal contains 37.6 percent, 
digestible protein and 9.6 percent, digestible fat. 
The fertilizer constituents of a ton of cotton- 
seed meal are 113 pounds nitrogen, 36 pounds 
potash, and 54 pounds phosphoric acid, costing 
at least $21.45 if bought in the form of com- 
mercial fertilizers. 

79. Cottonseed hulls are produced in slightly 
larger amount than cottonseed meal by the oil 
mills. Cottonseed hulls contains 0.3 percent, 
digestible protein and 1.7 percent, digestible 
fat; for comparison, corn stover (fodder with 
the ears removed) contains 1.4 percent, di- 
gestible protein and 0.7 percent, digestible 
fat. The fertilizer constituents of a ton of 
cottonseed hulls are 13.4 pounds nitrogen, 20.8 
pounds potash, and 8.6 pounds phosphoric acid, 
costing $3.38 if bought as commercial fertilizer. 
The most extended use to which cottonseed hulls 
have been put is as roughage for short-fed 



THE GRAIN 47 

steers receiving cottonseed hulls and cotton- 
seed meal as practically their sole ration. 

80. Cottonseed may be fed profitably to stock 
cattle being wintered on rough feed, the 
amounts being limited to about two pounds per 
day per head. This is about the only purpose 
for which it is advisable to feed cottonseed in 
preference to cottonseed meal or cake, and if 
the roughage contains considerable grain, such 
as kafircorn or milomaize, the feeding of small 
amounts of meal or cake is likely to be more 
generali}^ satisfactory. Cottonseed should never 
be fed to hogs. They may eat some of it and 
get away with it if they have free range and 
plenty of green feed, Wt some of them are 
very likely to die. The feeding of any con- 
siderable amount of cottonseed to cows makes 
the butter hard and tallowy, and it is practically 
impossible to compound a properly balanced 
ration using any considerable amount of cotton- 
seed. 

81. For horses, cottonseed meal combined 
with three to five times as much kafircorn, milo- 
maize, or corn is an improvement over any of 
these grains fed alone. But cottonseed meal 
should not be fed to horses in larger amounts 
than this and should never be fed as the sole 
ration of any animal. A few experiment sta- 
tions have used cottonseed meal as a part of 
the feed for work horses and the results have 
been generally satisfactory. Horses do not seem 



48 SURE FEED CROPS 

to like cottonseed meal, and the amount fed 
per day should in no case be more than two 
pounds. 

82. For dairy cows, cottonseed meal is gen-' 
erally a very economical feedstuff. It should 
never be fed alone. Three parts of ground 
kafircom, milomaize, or corn, mixed with one 
part of cottonseed meal, at the usual prices, 
makes a cheaper, and always a more effective 
ration than any of these grains fed separately. 
The excess of protein of the cottonseed meal is 
balanced by the excess of starchy materials of 
the kafircorn, milomaize, or com and both 
classes of food materials are more fully utilized 
by the cows. The ration should gradually be 
increased to the amount which the different 
cows will put to good use in the increased pro- 
duction of milk. The certainty of production of 
kafircorn, milomaize, and cottonseed meal in 
seasons of extreme drouth, and their high feed- 
ing value, make them of great value in main- 
taining the stability of the dairy industry in 
regions of variable rainfall. (27) Fed as sug- 
gested, there is absolutely no danger to the 
health of cows receiving cottonseed meal. In- 
stead, their condition and production will stead- 
ily improve because of their needs being sup- 
plied with properly balanced food nutrients. 

83. For fattening steers, cottonseed meal is 
very satisfactory as a part of the ration. Nu- 
merous feeding experiments have established 



THE GRAIN 49 

its value and determined the general manner 
in which it should be used. Where the rough 
feed consists of kafir, milo, or corn fodder, 
sorghum or prairie hay, the grain ration should 
consist of two parts ground kafir, milo, or corn 
to one part of cottonseed meal. If alfalfa or 
cowx)ea hay constitutes a portion of the rough 
feed, the proportion of cottonseed meal in the 
grain ration may be reduced to one-fourth or 
one-fifth for the most of the feeding period, and 
increased to one-third toward the close. If kafir 
or milo fodder or silage containing consider- 
able grain is fed, cottonseed cake may be fed, 
gradually increasing the amount to four pounds 
per day per head. The fact always to be kept 
in mind is that in feeding cottonseed meal or 
cake to cattle of any class, they should receive 
kafircom, milomaize, or com to balance the 
ration. Where rough feed is abundant and con- 
tains some grain, cottonseed meal or cake may 
be fed without admixture with other grain, but 
slower gains will be obtained. Unless the 
roughage supplies grain, cottonseed meal should 
not comprise more than one-third of the total 
grain ration. 

84. Hogs may follow cattle being fed cotton- 
seed meal and will make profitable gains, es- 
pecially if there are hogs enough to clean up 
the droppings completely and to require a lit- 
tle ground kafircorn, milomaize, or corn in 
addition. This is the most satisfactory manner 



50 SURE FEED CROPS 

in which to feed cottonseed meal to hogs and 
losses are very rare when tliis is the practice. 
Cottonseed meal will not do at all as an exclu- 
sive grain ration for hogs, but it may be fed 
with profit in amounts of from one-tenth to one- 
fifth of the total grain ration of fattening hogs. 
Long continued feeding of larger amounts of 
cottonseed meal to hogs frequently results in 
losses and when there are the first symptoms 
of trouble, it is well to drop the cottonseed meal 
out of the ration for a week or two. Many 
feeders sour the ration containing cottonseed 
meal by soaking in water ; others find that hogs 
receiving wheat or rye pasture while on a ration 
containing cottonseed meal are rarely troubled 
from its effects. The feeder who will use cot- 
tonseed meal judiciously in fattening hogs will 
find it very profitable. The careless feeder, 
who will not go to the trouble of taking the sim- 
ple precautions necessary, is very likely to suf- 
fer losses. A feeder in Washita county. West- 
ern Oklahoma, reported: **I have never soaked 
nor soured a pound of cottonseed meal before 
feeding to hogs. I have fed cottonseed meal to 
as high as one-fifth of the grain ration, usually 
from a sixth to a tenth, for the last six years 
and I have never lost a hog. In the spring of 
1912, for a tail-end bunch I fed them for ninety 
days on one-fifth cottonseed meal and ground 
kafircorn. They had the run of a small wheat 
pasture. Another man in Washita county fed 
out two car loads in 1910, and a finer and better 



THE GRAIN 51 

finished bunch of hogs I never saw. He fed 
them soaked corn and one-fifth cottonseed meal. 
He soaked his corn separately and then put it 
in the trough and poured the cottonseed meal 
over it. The hogs were all alfalfa-grown hogs. 
He fed them sixty days and they gained two 
pounds a day. Another Washita county feeder 
in 1911 fed seven tons of cottonseed meal to 
three cars of hogs at a ratio of about one to four 
with corn. He fed seven hundred and fifty dol- 
lars worth of feed and sold nineteen hundred 
dollars worth of hogs. This man was induced to 
try the meal after reading of the man who fed 
the two carloads the year before. But before 
he would risk the bunch, he visited the other 
feeder and then went home and penned up a 
few of tlie stringiest old sows he had to make 
a test for himself. They made such fine gains 
in so short a time without loss that he laid in a 
supply of cottonseed meal and went after the 
rest of his herd in earnest. " (29.) 

85. As feed for calves, neither cottonseed nor 
cottonseed meal is satisfactory. They do not 
have the proper composition to replace the fat 
of milk removed by skimming. Ground kafir- 
corn, milomaize, or corn is entirely satisfactory 
for this purpose. (25.) 

86. All of the cottonseed meal produced in 
the states of the southwest should be fed here. 
The plant food alone which it contains is worth 
almost as much as it sells for. It contains the 



52 SURE FEED CROPS 

nitrogenous material- necessary to balance the 
excess of starch contained in kafircorn and milo- 
maize and its oil overcomes the slightly con- 
stipating tendency of these feeds. The greatest 
profit from these crops is obtained by feeding 
them to livestock in the communities which pro- 
duce them, thereby obtaining the higher prices 
for the finished product, and retaining the ele- 
ments of plant food to maintain the fertility of 
the soil for the production of future crops. But 
an abundance of cottonseed meal cannot be 
utilized in the absence of production of kafir- 
corn and milomaize, in years when corn is a 
failure. And the fact that cottonseed meal is 
one of the surest of feed crops is the reason for 
including it in this discussion. It is a foolish 
waste for the farmers of the south to continue 
shipping their fertility to Europe, receiving in 
return scarcely more than they pay for plant 
food bought as commercial fertilizers. But they 
can escape from this waste only by the produc- 
tion of other sure feed crops which will place 
the livestock industry on a foundation from 
which it cannot be dislodged by a season of 
short rainfall and excessive temperatures. 



THE FORAGE 



ALFALFA 



87. Alfalfa fully compensates for the uncer- 
tainty of the corn crop in regions having a 
variable annual rainfall averaging from twenty- 
five to thirty-five inches. Within this belt in 
Kansas, Nebraska, and Oklahoma, a larger pro- 
portion of the total area than of any other part 
of the earth's surface of equal size is producing 
alfalfa profitably. Texas contains a vast, un- 
developed region of a similar character which 
ultimately, there is every reason for believing, 
will grow alfalfa fully as well. With the full 
utilization of suitable soils in the production of 
alfalfa, and appreciation of the certainty with 
which kafircorn, milomaize, and cotton produce 
grain for raising and fattening all classes of 
livestock, the people of this region, who once 
resented its being designated *' semi-arid,'' will 
be proud to proclaim it as such. 

88. Alfalfa is invulnerable, almost, to damage 
from long-continued drouth when once firmly 
established. In Oklahoma, the seasons of 1909 
and 1910 were below the average in amount and 
seasonable distribution of rainfall. The year 

53 



54 SUEE FEED CROPS 

following, 1911, surpassed all previous records 
for unfavorable conditions. In September of 
that year nearly all of the alfalfa fields in some 
counties looked brown and almost bare of vege- 
tation, and many feared that the alfalfa had 
died. In April, 1912, after sufficient rains to 
soak the soil and penetrate the subsoil to a 
depth of perhaps ^ve feet, not a single field of 
alfalfa which was examined along fifty miles 
of road, in a county where drouth had been most 
severe, appeared noticeably damaged. Where 
it had not been pastured, the alfalfa was then 
standing from six to ten inches high. During 
the years of drouth, it had produced more net 
returns than any other crop. And when the 
rains came, without expenditure of money, time 
or effort, save perhaps to loosen the sun-baked 
soil, alfalfa was ready to produce a crop in May 
worth more money than the net returns from 
other crops after an entire season's labors. The 
marvelous ability to withstand extremes of 
drouth and heat which alfalfa has shown, when 
once established, furnishes the strongest of rea- 
sons for extending the acreage until it occupies 
all suitable soils within this region where soil 
and climate are so favorable for its growth. 

89. Not all soils will grow alfalfa profitably 
under ordinary conditions of preparation of 
the soil and care of the stand of alfalfa when 
once secured. The most favorable soils are the 
fertile, alluvial, and comparatively level lands 



THE FOEAGE 55 

bordering the streams, above the overflow and 
commonly called ''second bottom land." The 
best of these are those with a close surface soil 
changing rapidly to a moderately open subsoil 
into which the tap roots of alfalfa may easily 
penetrate. When the subsoil is not of very 
tough clay, with rock close to the surface, the 
surface soil may even be quite sandy and, aside 
from increased difficulty in obtaining a stand 
which may be overcome by proper methods 
which are discussed later, (98) be entirely sat- 
isfactory for maximum alfalfa production. 
The character of the soil rather than its loca- 
tion with reference to streams determines its 
natural adaptability to this crop and many wide 
areas of such soil exist far removed from 
streams. 

90. Fertility of the soil is important in estab- 
lishing alfalfa, It is established with difficulty, 
for example, on soils which have been cropped 
to wheat successively for many years until de- 
ficient in available plant food, and especially in 
available nitrogen. Sandy soils on which have 
been grown clean culture crops, without re- 
turning vegetable matter to the soil, until most 
of the humus has disappeared are not in con- 
dition for seeding to alfalfa. The ''hard 
lands'^ which have been farmed for several 
years without manuring until they have become 
sticky and pasty, forming thick crusts after 
rains and great cracks after drouths, are not 
easily transformed into profitable alfalfa fields. 



56 SURE FEED CROPS 

While perhaps less than one-twentieth of the 
total area of the states of the Central South- 
west is land on which alfalfa may profitably be 
grown on a large scale, on fully nine-tenths of 
the farms is some land which, if given proper 
preparation, will produce alfalfa at a profit for 
the livestock of the farm. 

91. A deep seed bed, but firm right up to the 
surface; enough moisture in the soil to germi- 
nate the seed and establish the plants without 
rain; and good seed, free from weed seed and 
sure to grow, are essential to obtaining a stand 
of alfalfa. These conditions may be obtained 
in various ways but are the fundamentals which 
should always be kept in mind. Young alfalfa 
plants are exceedingly tender and often must 
combat conditions over which the farmer has 
no control. This makes it all the more impor- 
tant that close attention be given to those fac- 
tors which can be controlled. 

92. Stubble lands, from which a crop of wheat 
or oats have been harvested in June, may be 
put into excellent shape for sowing to alfalfa 
between August 15th and September 20th, if 
there is sufficient rainfall during that period. 
Such land should be thoroughly disked just 
after the grain is cut, the disk harrow follow- 
ing the binder around the field. This saves the 
moisture in the soil and breaks down the stub- 
ble so that the soil turned over will pack read- 
ily and make good connection with the bottom 



THE FORAGE 57 

of tlie furrow. Plowing should be done as soon 
as possible. The depth of plowing should de- 
pend on the previous depth to which the land 
has been plowed. It is not desirable to turn 
up more than an inch of the subsoil, but plow- 
ing to a depth of less than six to eight inches is 
poor preparation. Each half -day's plowing 
should be gone over at once with a sub-surface 
packer, or a heavily weighted disk harrow set 
nearly straight, going along with the furrows. 
Enough har rowings should be given to keep 
down the weeds and grass and to prevent the 
formation of a crust, but not enough to reduce 
the surface soil to a powder which will blow 
easily. 

93. Do not disk land to be sown to alfalfa at 
any time after it has been plowed and packed. 
If harrowing has been neglected until a sod of 
grass and weeds, or a hard crust, has formed, 
the damage cannot be repaired by disking and 
loosening the surface to a depth of three to ^ve 
inches. Perhaps this is the mistake most com- 
monly made by those who have had no experi- 
ence with alfalfa. They have a notion that a 
*^deep, mellow seed bed" will be made by the 
disk harrow and that alfalfa sown in such a 
seed bed will start right off and grow. But 
when sown after a disking, the alfalfa seed is 
placed in a bed of dust or in soil full of air 
spaces which dries out quickly, and unless rain 



58 SURE FEED CROPS 

sufficient to firm the soil about the alfalfa seed 
falls very soon after sowing, failure results. 

94. If land for corn was plowed deep, and the 
corn was given clean cultivation which left it 
level, and the crop is matured, cut as low as 
possible, and removed from the land before 
September 1st, good stands of alfalfa may be 
obtained from sowing into the corn stalks. 
Disking the stalks, unless heavy rains follow, 
is likely to loosen the soil to too great a depth. 
The stalks should be dragged down, using a 
weighted section harrow thrown down flat; this 
may not be necessary if the stubs are very 
short. Harrowing enough to smooth out in- 
equalities in the soil may sometimes be desir- 
able but care should be taken not to destroy the 
good seed bed which the cultivation of the corn 
crop has prepared. (91) Exceptionally favor- 
able conditions and careful work are requisites 
for success in fall seeding of alfalfa after corn. 

95. Fall seeding of alfalfa is more generally 
successful than spring seeding east of the 
thirty-five inch rainfall line, and is generally 
preferred by alfalfa growers. In all cases, con- 
ditions at the time when the sowing should be 
done must determine whether to sow or to save 
the seed and wait until spring. Unless the seed 
bed is well settled and filled with moisture, so 
that the sowing may be completed not less than 
thirty days before the average date of the first 



THE FORAGE 59 

killing frost, it is safer to wait. The work of 
preparation will not be lost ; usually such land is 
in the best of condition for early spring seed- 
ing, if not spoiled by disking or plowing again. 

96. Preparation for spring seeding should be- 
gin at least a year before the time alfalfa is to 
be sown. Weeds and grass should be killed out 
by growing crops which assist in their eradica- 
tion. If the land is to be planted to corn, cotton, 
or other clean culture crops, it should first be 
plowed deep and the work of the cultivator 
should be supplemented with the hoe and no 
weed seed should be permitted to mature. ^ If 
wheat or oats are to be followed the next spring 
with alfalfa, a crop of cowpeas (169, 170) grown 
on the stubble and pastured off or plowed under 
will add to the fertility of the surface soil and 
greatly improve the chances of success. The 
plowing should be completed in all cases before 
the last of December. If the soil is of the kind 
which drifts with the winds, it may be well to 
leave it rough. Methods must be modified^ to 
suit soil conditions, but harrowing and firming 
of the soil should be done so as to put the land 
in condition before March 1st for seeding when 
weather conditions become suitable. 

97. The time of spring seeding cannot be fixed 
by dates on the calendar. Just when to sow 
must be determined by the temperature of the 
soil and weather conditions. The earlier al- 
falfa is sown after danger of hard freezes is 



60 SURE FEED CROPS 

past, the better the chances for success. Alfalfa 
sown in March, if it escapes a freeze, will with- 
stand drouth much' better than later sowings. 
This was well illustrated in the very unfavor- 
able season of 1911 when practically the only 
spring-sown alfalfa which came through with a 
good stand was that sown in March. Alfalfa 
sown in April has an unequal struggle with the 
winds and weeds of spring, and if sown in May, 
there is danger of damage from the dashing 
rains. The later the sowing in the spring, the 
more trouble there will be with weeds and grass. 

98. Sandy lands comiorlse approximately one- 
third of the area of Oklahoma. Not all are so 
sandy that they blow, but there are wide areas 
where it is very difficult to hold the soil in place 
until crops are established. Methods of get- 
ting alfalfa established on such soils are very 
different from those necessary to success on 
hard lands. With soils only moderately sandy, 
and in regions where there is usually moisture 
enough for fall seeding, plowing may be done 
in June or July and the soil should be worked 
down as firmly as possible. The danger of loss 
then comes from the fall and winter winds. 
Some have overcome the blowing by scattering 
rotten straw with a manure spreader, just 
thickly enough to stop the sweep of the winds 
but not enough to smother the plants. It may 
be necessary to press the straw into the soil 
by running a disk harrow, set straight, over it. 



THE FORAGE 61 

Otliers liave sown a small amount of sorghum, 
kaiircom, or broom corn seed, or spring oats 
with alfalfa in the fall. These come up, make 
some growth in the fall, but are killed by frost. 
The dead plants remain through the winter and 
into spring, and protect the alfalfa plants from 
the wind. 

99. New land, if the soil is sandy, is better 
for alfalfa than soil which has been farmed 
without manuring until most of its vegetable 
matter has disappeared. The sod, when chopped 
up with a disk harrow, will hold the sand to- 
gether until the alfalfa covers it. 

100. Decayed vegetable matter, incorporated 
with sandy soils, will help hold them in place 
until alfalfa may be established. Some have 
successfully followed the plan of sowing sor- 
ghum on sandy soil in the spring and plowing 
it under just before it heads. This decays 
quickly and is followed with spring oats sown 
early in September. This when frozen down 
protects the surface of the soil and prevents 
drifting. In March, alfalfa is sown into the 
dead oats with a disk drill, disturbing the soil 
cover as little as possible. These are a few of 
the ways which have been tried with var^dng 
results on very sandy lands. It taxes the pa- 
tience and ingenuity of the man who is farm- 
ing sandy land when he sets about getting a 
stand of alfalfa. When once established, the 
crop, however, is worth all of the perseverance 



62 SUEE FEED CROPS 

necessary to obtain it. Where the sandy land 
is reasonably level, with water ten to twenty feet 
from the surface, permanent success with al- 
falfa when once established is certain. 

101. The amount of seed usually sown is 
twenty pounds per acre. If conditions for sow- 
ing are ideal and the alfalfa seed is perfect, ten 
pounds to the acre is enough. That amount of 
seed, if all of it grows, will make more plants 
than there is room for. But it is rare that 
everything is just right and fifteen pounds to 
the acre is as little as it is advisable to sow 
under average conditions. It is a waste of seed 
to sow more than twenty pounds. The best 
seed for sowing in the states of the Central 
Southwest is that produced as near as possible 
to the place where it is to be sown. Seed pro- 
duced on irrigated land is not satisfactory. 

102. Alfalfa seed should be tested for germi- 
nation and examined for weed seed before pur- 
chasing, if possible, and certainly before sow- 
ing. The Experiment Stations, at Manhattan, 
Kansas; Stillwater, Oklahoma; Fayetteville, 
Arkansas; and College Station, Texas, make 
these tests, usually without charge. An ounce 
of the seed should be sent at least two weeks 
before a report is needed. Neglect of this pre- 
caution may result in getting a troublesome 
start of dodder and other pests along with the 
alfalfa. 



THE FORAGE 63 

103. * * Alfalfa will not grow here ' * is an expres- 
sion frequently heard by way of apology for 
wasting fine alfalfa lands in growing wheat or 
cotton, or trying to grow com on them. A town- 
ship in southern Oklahoma, along the Red River, 
furnishes one example. It is a beautiful coun- 
try, comparatively level, with excellent roads 
and a sandy loam soil with a comparatively open 
subsoil. Many farmers reported that alfalfa 
*Moes no good" there; that it had been tried 
and died out. This is an old story and has been 
repeatedly disproven after the men who farm 
the land have learned how to grow alfalfa. 
Farther west in Oklahoma, other communities 
along the same river, with exactly similar con- 
ditions, though not quite so favorable, have 
found alfalfa the most profitable crop which 
they can grow. 

104. Thickening a thin stand of alfalfa is not 

always easily done, and it is practically im- 
possible after the stand is more than a year old. 
If a satisfactory stand is not obtained from 
spring seeding, it may be thickened by harrow- 
ing or drilling in five to ten pounds of seed per 
acre in September, and again early the follow- 
ing March if the fall seeding failed to take hold. 
In the same manner, an unsatisfactory stand of 
alfalfa from fall seeding may be thickened by 
sowing more seed early in March, giving a light 
harrowing to cover. After alfalfa is more than 
a year old, it is better to plow up a poor stand 



64 SURE FEED CEOPS 

and start over again, than to attempt to thicken 
it by sowing seed. 

105. Sowing alfalfa seed should be carefully 
done. Drilling, with implements which may be 
properly adjusted, permits the seed to be placed 
at a definite depth in moist soil and completely 
covered. This is especially important with 
sandy soils. With firmer soils, broadcasting is 
satisfactory. The soil should never be disked 
just before sowing. Instead, if the soil is full 
of moisture and a crust is just beginning to 
form on the surface, it should be harrowed be- 
fore broadcasting only enough to make dis- 
tinct harrow marks and slightly break the crust. 
Then a good cross harrowing after sowing will 
place most of the seed in moist soil and cover 
it to the proper depth. Alfalfa should not be 
covered to a depth of more than an inch to an 
inch and a half in such soils. If that depth of 
covering will not put the seed in moist soil, con- 
ditions are not right for sowing. In sandy soils, 
the seed may be placed as deep as two to three 
inches. 

106. The care of young alfalfa is of vital im- 
portance in establishing a stand. Weeds and 
grass often interfere and, at times, choke out 
the alfalfa before it becomes established. In 
the absence of weeds, spring sown alfalfa should 
not be clipped until it begins blooming or the 
leaves begin turning yellow and dropping off. 
The cutterbar of the mower should be set high. 



THE FORAGE 65 

If young alfalfa is clipped short in hot weather, 
much of it may die before the buds have pushed 
out new leaves. But if it is not cut when bloom- 
ing begins or the leaves begin dropping, the 
plants rapidly lose vitality. The treatment of 
weedy alfalfa must vary with the kind of 
weather and the kinds of weeds. Enough cut- 
tings should be made to keep the young alfalfa 
from being shaded out, but they should be made 
at such times as are most likely to weaken the 
weed growth. This may sometimes be done 
when the weeds are in bloom. Crabgrass makes 
the most trouble with alfalfa sown in the spring 
and frequent mowings are necessary to give the 
young alfalfa a chance at the sunlight. Alfalfa 
sown in the fall, if a stand is obtained, is usually 
not much damaged by grass and weeds unless 
the land is very foul. It pay always to kill out 
weeds and grass before sowing alfalfa, rather 
than to attempt it afterwards. 

107. For hay, alfalfa should always be cut 
when about one-tenth of the plants have come 
into bloom, or the lower leaves begin turning 
yellow and dropping off, or new growth begins 
from the buds at the base of the stems. Cut at 
this stage, the largest yield of digestible food 
materials will be obtained and the largest total 
crop through the season will be secured. When 
alfalfa comes into full bloom before cutting, 
many leaves are lost and the leaves are the most 
valuable part of the crop. The stems also be- 



66 SUEE FEED CROPS 

come woody and less of them are eaten; new 
growth also starts more slowly from stems 
which have partially matured. Many stands of 
young alfalfa are weakened by ^ Waiting for it 
to get big enough to cuf , after it has begun 
blooming. 

108. Methods of curing alfalfa hay must, of 
necessity, vary greatly, depending upon the 
amount of growth, moisture in the soil and air, 
wind and sunshine. All steps taken should be 
directed toward saving the greatest possible 
amount of leaves. This can be accomplished by 
keeping the plants alive and transpiring mois- 
ture through the leaves for the longest possi- 
ble time after cutting. Allowing to wilt in the 
swath and to cure in windrows, formed prefer- 
ably with a side-delivery rake, seems to be the 
best general plan. West of the line of thirty- 
inches average annual rainfall, weather condi- 
tions are often such that the problem is to get 
the alfalfa raked and stacked before it has 
dried out too thoroughly. It should not be put 
up^ as long as juice may be squeezed from a 
twisted bunch of stems. But it should not be 
permitted to lie in the swath until most of the 
leaves rattle off as it is raked. Every cutting 
of a crop of alfalfa requires the srood judgment 
of the man in charge, workino: for the proper 
condition of the product instead of blindly fol- 
lowing any set of rules. The fullest possible 
use should be made of machinery in handling 



THE FORAGE 67 

alfalfa, especially where there is any consider- 
able acreage of it. Sheds for storing^ the hay, 
and stack covers, quickly pay back their cost in 
preventing damage from rains. 

109. Cultivation of alfalfa needs to be done 
with judgment and must vary greatly with the 
character of the soil and the extent to which the 
alfalfa has been pastured. The over-enthusias- 
tic use of the disk harrow, while seeming to give 
temporary benefit, has weakened many good 
stands of alfalfa. An ordinary smoothing har- 
row, weighted and set so that it will take hold, 
may be used with profit before growth starts 
in the spring on practically all alfalfa over one 
year old. And it can scarcely be used so as to 
do harm. If the soil is crusted or weeds and 
grass are starting at any time immediately after 
a crop has been cut, another harrowing will pay 
in nearly all cases. Where firm soils have been 
compacted by pasturing, judicious use of the 
disk harrow just as growth is starting in the 
spring is generally advisable. It will loosen 
the soil, save moisture, and admit air to the soil 
without which alfalfa cannot attain proper de- 
velopment. Spike-toothed disk harrows and 
special alfalfa cultivators with very narrow 
shovels are used by many with success and are 
especially useful in digging out crabgrass. All 
cultivation of alfalfa should be directed toward 
eliminating useless and harmful plants without 
doing damage to the crowns and roots of the al- 



68 SURE FEED CEOPS 

falfa plants. If the spike-toothed disk harrow 
is run at too great an angle, the crowns may be 
caught between the teeth of the disk and pulled 
up. If run with less angle and more weight or 
more times over, they do good work. 

110. Webworms often destroy one or more 
cuttings of alfalfa during a season. Various 
spraying methods have been proposed and tried 
but the most practicable plan for fighting this 
pest seems to consist in cutting the crop as soon 
as they begin damaging it, and thus taking their 
food away from them. This should be done no 
matter at what stage of growth the alfalfa may 
be, because if left undisturbed, the webworms 
will strip the plant of leaves and damage sub- 
sequent crops. If the alfalfa is a year old or 
more, it should be given a thorous:h harrowing 
after removing the hay. This will wool the 
worms around in the dust and put a great many 
of them out of business, and it will give the rest 
of them a notion that it is about time to move 
on. A flock of turkeys ranging over the alfalfa 
field will contribute largely to the prevention of 
insect damage. 

111. A seed crop cannot always be obtained 
with certainty from alfalfa. The second or 
the third cutting is usually left for seed. In 
regions with more than thirty inches average 
annual rainfall, profitable seed crops are ob- 
tained only in dry years. Conditions of the soil 
as to moisture must determine, at the time al- 



THE FOEAGE 69 

falfa is coming into bloom, whether the alfalfa 
should be cut for hay or left for seed. A strong, 
vigorous growth of plants and a soil full of 
moisture do not give ideal conditions for seed 
production. Instead, the best yields of seed are 
obtained from a rather short growth and 
moderately dry soil. Heavy rains coming while 
a short growth of alfalfa is in bloom may force 
new growth which, coming up among the old 
growth, will prevent the formation and curing 
of a good seed crop. It requires about the time 
necessary for the growth of two cuttings of 
alfalfa hay to grow and mature a crop of seed. 
With this, as with all other phases of the man- 
agement of alfalfa, the exercise of knowledge 
and judgment by the man in charge is neces- 
sary and no rules can be followed. When ob- 
tained, a seed crop is very profitable. In the 
season of 1911, 3de]ds as high as twelve bushels 
of alfalfa seed per acre were reported from 
small areas in Oklahoma, and large crops of 
from five to ten bushels per acre were frequent. 
But on the average, from two to five bushels 
per acre is a very fair yield. 

112. Dodder is a pest of alfalfa when once it 
gets started. It is a native plant in at least part 
of Oklahoma but oftener is sown with alfalfa 
seed. The seed is somewhat similar to that of 
alfalfa and should be carefully guarded against. 
After dodder germinates, it twines about the 
alfalfa stems and takes root in them, becoming 



70 SUEE FEED CROPS 

a parasitic growth. Straw or trash should be 
piled on the small patches of dodder when first 
noticed, and burned. Seed should never be 
saved from fields of alfalfa in which there is 
dodder. 

113. Different conditions of soil and climate 
present different problems in establishing and 
managing alfalfa. A few such problems have 
been selected from one year's correspondence 
with farmers, chiefly in Oklahoma. They may 
serve to present the various questions in a 
slightly different form from the foregoing and 
assist those who are determined to get for them- 
selves a stand of this valuable crop. 

114. Alfalfa in rows. ''I am farming tight 
land and am thinking of planting alfalfa in 
rows and cultivating the same as corn. Is such 
a plan practicable!'' — Texas county. Western 
Oklahoma. This plan of growing alfalfa is fol- 
lowed with success in Wyoming and is being 
experimented with by a few in Western Okla- 
homa. The rows should be not less than thirty 
inches apart and preferably thirty-six to forty- 
two inches. The land should be comparatively 
level. After the alfalfa is established, it should 
be cultivated shallow after each cutting and 
then cross-harrowed to keep the land level. 
Thorough preparation of the soil to get the 
land in good condition should precede tlie sow- 
ing. (91.) 



THE FORAGE 71 

115, Alfalfa on sod. ''I am having some sod 
broke ; it is good alfalfa land and I want event- 
ually to put it in that. Will it do to sow- 
alfalfa without cuitivating for at least a yearT' 
— Jackson county, Western Oklahoma. If there 
is sufficient moisture, there is every reason for 
expecting that alfalfa will do as well sown on 
the sod land as after it has been cultivated for a 
year or two. Many have succeeded in establish- 
ing alfalfa on sod land. It should be plowed 
early at least six inches deep, then thoroughly 
disked and chopped fine and, if there is enough 
rain to soak it thoroughly, chances are good for 
success if the seed is sown early in March in 
your county. Summer tilling and sowing in the 
fall will be more certain to kill the native 
grasses. 

116. Alfalfa on sandy land. ''I want to sow 
some alfalfa in the spring on sandy land if con- 
ditions will permit. My land had cotton on it 
the past season. Should the stalks be pulled 
and removed before plowing, so that the soil 
will turn over more compactly f — Logan 
county, Central Oklahoma. If the land is com- 
paratively level and not ridged up along the 
cotton rows, it may be just as well to chop the 
cotton stalks with a stalk cutter and not to plow 
the sandy soil. Early in February, the land 
should be disked and harrowed enough to 
smooth it, and the alfalfa seed should be sown 
in early March, so as to get it established ahead 



72 SUEE FEED CROPS 

of the April winds. If the wind begins drifting 
the sand, put on a light coat of straw or rotten 
hay or manure and press it into the soil by run- 
ning a disk harrow over it, set nearly straight. 
Usually, fall is better than spring for seeding 
alfalfa on sandy lands. Each case must be 
handled separately, and the individual must be 
prepared to meet emergencies which may arise. 
Many have succeeded with fall seeding by sow- 
ing a small amount of sorghum or broom corn 
seed or oats with the alfalfa. This comes up 
and protects against blowing and is killed by 
frost before it gets big enough to damage the 
alfalfa. The dead plants protect the surface 
of the soil through the winter and save the al- 
falfa until it covers the ground in the spring. 
Of course, this plan would not work at all with 
spring seeding, as the sorghum, oats, or broom 
com would choke out the alfalfa. 

117. Alfalfa on sandy land. "My farm is in 
the blackjacks, sandy soil. If I prepare for 
seeding to alfalfa as I would like and there 
comes a hard rain and wind, I lose out. I have 
five acres of wheat that my hogs ran on. How 
will it do to sow alfalfa into this wheat? It is 
thin on the ground. Would it be better to pre- 
pare the land and sow a few oats with the al- 
falfa ? It is a waste of time and money to sow 
alfalfa on this land without something to pro- 
tect it." — Caddo county. Central Oklahoma. 
You may succeed in getting alfalfa started 



THE FOEAGE 73 

where you have wheat by sowing the seed into it 
late in February or early in March and keeping 
the stock off. After the wheat and alfalfa get 
up, the wheat should be cut so as to let the 
sun shine down to the alfalfa. If you want to 
sow in the spring, this plan is as likely to suc- 
ceed as any. 

118. Alfalfa in orchard. '' Will alfalfa injure 
apple, pear, or other fruit trees T' — Major 
county. Western Oklahoma. Alfalfa will almost 
certainly kill fruit trees if established in the 
orchard. It is possible that it might not kill 
pear trees but, in general, the orchard is the 
last place alfalfa should be sown and then only 
after it has been determined that the orchard is 
not wanted any longer. Alfalfa is able to with- 
stand the effect of drouth because of the long 
tap root which it sends into the subsoil. In sea- 
sons when the trees are short of moisture for 
maturing fruit and keeping alive, the alfalfa 
will already have exhausted much of the limited 
supply and the trees will perish. 

119. In kafircorn stubble. "Last March, I 
plowed and planted ten acres of kafircorn and 
cowpeas alternately. By the time the kafir got 
up, the sandburrs had sodded. I let the whole 
mess go until July, plowed the stuff imder, 
double harrowed, and sowed kafir and cane for 
feed ; cut and stacked the last of October. This 
left the ground clean. With so much moisture 
in the ground, it appears to be my chance for 



74 SURE FEED CROPS 

ten more acres of alfalfa. Would it be advisable 
to sow right in where I cut off the feed? The 
soil is sandy loam and is nice and loose. The 
ground had two good plowings last year. It 
has been snowing here for twenty-four hours 
and we had seven feet of moisture before it be- 
gan.'' — Ellis county, Western Oklahoma. This 
is a good chance for establishing alfalfa on 
sandy soil. Alfalfa should be sown into the 
stubble without any preparation and the earlier 
it is sown and misses a freeze, the better will 
be the chance for alfalfa getting established and 
overcoming the sand burrs. With abundant 
moisture and a sandy soil, the stubble left on 
the land will be of advantage in preventing blow- 
ing. 

120. In humid climate. ''I have black sandy 
loam with yellow clay foundation, prairie bot- 
tom land; also some sandy mountain land with 
red clay foundation. Will either do to sow to 
alfalfa f — Muskogee county, Eastern Okla- 
homa. If the prairie bottom land is well drained 
and does not overflow, it is the land on which 
you should endeavor to establish alfalfa. This 
soil may be sour and if it is, ground limestone 
should be applied at the rate of about a ton to 
the acre. If the land is weedy, it probably 
would be well to put it to oats, plow as soon as 
the oats are cut, and work it down to a firm seed 
bed so that the alfalfa may be sown as early 
in September as there is sufficient moisture. 



THE FORAGE 75 

You will probably obtain better results from fall 
sowing than from spring sowing in Muskogee 
county. 

121. In kafircorn stubble. ''I have a piece of 
bottom land which I wish to get set to alfalfa. 
I sowed this land to alfalfa in the spring of 
1909 but did not get a good stand, so I plowed 
it up in the spring of 1911 and planted corn. 
When the corn failed, we planted cane and kafir- 
corn. This land was well plowed last spring 
and is clean but it was too dry to fall plow and 
now it is too wet. Will it do to disk thoroughly 
and sow alfalfa this spring without plowing it 
again f — Tillman county, Western Oklahoma. 
With such an abundance of moisture, it is pos- 
sible that you may be able to get this land in 
shape for sowing without plowing. The stubble 
of the sorghum and kafircorn should be disked 
out as soon as you possibly can and tliis should 
be followed by a sufficient number of harrow- 
ings to put the surface in condition for sowing. 
With enough rain to settle the soil loosened by 
the disking, the land should be in good shape 
for sowing to alfalfa early in March. 

122. Oats after alfalfa. ^'I have thinned one 
piece of my alfalfa with hogs and have plowed 
it up, but it was not wet enough to plow more 
than three or four inches deep. Will that do 
for oats ? I want a sowed crop so as to fall 
plow and get it back to alfalfa the following 
spring. This piece of land has been in alfalfa 



76 SURE FEED CROPS 

four years ; has been farmed since 1896, and had 
been plowed from eight to ten inches deep be- 
fore seeding to alfalfa.'' — Custer county, West- 
ern Oklahoma. The old alfalfa field which has 
been plowed shallow ought to be in good con- 
dition for seeding to oats by the last of Feb- 
ruary; in better condition, perhaps, than if it 
had been plowed deeper. If you can get the 
oats stubble plowed deep soon after harvesting, 
you may be able to get the land in shape for fall 
seeding to alfalfa and thus gain a little time. 
If conditions for fall seeding are not good, the 
land will be in the best of condition for spring 
seeding. 

123. Alfalfa in wheat. ^^I have a field in 
wheat and want to put it in alfalfa. The ground 
is in good shape and there is a good stand of 
wheat. Will it pay me to sow alfalfa in the 
wheat this spring? Or would I better wait until 
fall I" — Kingfisher county. Central Oklahoma. 
It certainly will not pay to sow alfalfa in wheat. 
The stubble should be disked as the wheat is 
being cut, and the land plowed and prepared 
for fall seeding. 

124. Alfalfa after cowpeas. **I have cowpeas 
on some land which I want to sow to alfalfa this 
fall; also some rotten manure mixed with dirt 
out in the cow lot. Will it do to plow the cow- 
peas and manure under or is it better to make 
hay of the cowpeas and disk the manure inT' 
— Cleveland county, Central Oklahoma. It will 



THE FORAGE 77 

be better to remove the cowpeas and use them 
for hay, and then disk in the manure. It 
will not be possible to get a properly firmed 
seed bed for fall seeding if the cowpeas are 
plowed under. Turning the cowpeas and ma- 
nure under early in the fall will put the land 
in good condition for spring seeding. 

125. Alfalfa in oats. **I have forty acres of 
old land which I sowed to oats about January 
1st. They are coming up fine and not hurt by 
the freeze. What would you think of sowing al- 
falfa right on the oats? This is sometimes done 
and it does look as if, with this wet season, it 
will be the thing to do.^' — Jackson county, West- 
ern Oklahoma. Usually it is poor business to 
sow alfalfa with oats or into oats. But with an 
excellent supply of moisture, it seems a shame 
to miss a chance of getting alfalfa established. 
If you want to risk it, sow the alfalfa about the 
last of February. Later, if the oats appear to 
be interfering with the growth of the alfalfa, 
cut them for hay rather than wait for the crop 
to mature grain. This will be taking a chance 
but it is probably worth the taking. 

126. Reseedingf in spring. ^^Last summer, 
right after harvest, I plowed seven acres of 
wheat stubbles deep for alfalfa and harrowed 
twice right after plowing. That was during the 
first days of July. About the middle of August, 
we had a pretty fair rain. I harrowed to break 
the crust, sowed alfalfa seed, and harrowed 



78 SUEE FEED CEOPS 

again. The grasshoppers were thick here last 
fall and as soon as the little plants came up, 
they ate them off. I want to sow the same piece 
again this spring. Some of my neighbors tell 
me I should double-disk it, but I am afraid that 
will stir the soil up too deep. I intend to plow 
it shallow, only two inches deep, just enough to 
give the little roots a good start, because the 
soil is plenty moist this spring. Which is the 
best, double disking or plowing two to three 
inches deep?" — Garfield county, Central Okla- 
homa. This is a typical case ; there were many 
hundreds like it in the spring of 1912. The land 
should be neither plowed nor disked. As soon 
as dry enough in March, it should be given a 
very shallow harrowing with the teeth set slant- 
ing so as to make little furrows. Then a cross- 
harrowing will cover the broadcasted seed. Or 
the seed may be drilled into the soil without 
any harrowing. One of the most common causes 
of failure to get a stand of alfalfa is sowing on 
a loose seed bed. All that is needed is enough 
loose soil to cover the seed not over an inch 
deep. The disk harrow should never be used 
on land to be sown to alfalfa except to pack the 
soil immediately after plowing and fit it for har- 
rowing with the spike-toothed harrow. 

127. Alfalfa in rotation. ^^I have a quarter- 
section of bottom land which overflows once in 
six to ten years. About one hundred and forty 
acres are suitable for cultivation. The general 



THE FORAGE 79 

idea is to grow the maximum number of hogs 
each year, and to raise enough com and alfalfa 
to supply them. Will you be kind enough to 
give me a proper rotation for this placed' — 
Noble county, Central Oklahoma. The proper 
rotation for this farm is corn and alfalfa. Some 
alfalfa should be plowed up each year, planted 
to corn, and a like acreage of alfalfa sown. 
Through a series of years, both corn and alfalfa 
will thus be grown all over the place to the ad- 
vantage of both. In years of overflow which 
killed some alfalfa, the corn acreage probably 
would be large. It will likely be profitable to 
grow considerable alfalfa, buying the additional 
corn necessary to finish off the hogs which are 
largely grown on the alfalfa. Some kafircom 
should also be grown every year. 

128. Alfalfa and barley. **I want to get al- 
falfa started but there is no use in sowing here 
in the spring unless a nurse crop is used to keep 
out weeds and crabgrass. One seed house 
recommends sowing in the spring, using barley 
as a nurse crop. Will that work here? I think 
it is best to sow alfalfa in the fall here. Crab- 
grass grew knee high here since harvest and 
you can guess how alfalfa would look in such a 
mess.'' — Eogers county, Eastern Oklahoma. 
Land which is so foul as to make a nurse crop 
seem desirable for alfalfa is not in good condi- 
tion for seeding to alfalfa. Crabgrass will be 
ready to do business just the same after the 



80 SUEE FEED CROPS 

barley or other nurse crop is cut, and the nurse 
crop will have prevented the development of 
the alfalfa during the cool weather before the 
crabgrass starts. Such land should be cultivated 
to get it as clean as possible and prepared for 
fall seeding. 

129. Alfalfa dyingf out. "I have twenty-five 
acres of old alfalfa and twelve of last spring's 
seeding with a perfect stand on all of it. About 
two years ago, I noticed two streaks appearing 
in the large piece. They don't show much in the 
first two cuttings but when hot weather comes, 
and especially if it is a little dry, they are very 
noticeable, scarcely making any hay at all. 
These streaks are growing larger each year. 
This spring, the plants in them are apparently 
dead but I find by close examination that the 
roots are putting out buds under the ground 
so I guess they will start up after a while. The 
soil is rich, black, sandy loam with no gumbo or 
hard-pan. Some say alfalfa naturally runs out 
in from six to ten years and others say the roots 
reaching hard material causes these streaks. 
Please give me your opinion." — ^Kay county, 
Central Oklahoma. It would be nothing but a 
guess to attempt to explain the trouble which 
you are having with your alfalfa dying out in 
streaks. Alfalfa under normal conditions does 
not run out if it has good care and the soil is 
favorable. It should continue being productive 
for twenty-five years or more. It wiU pay, how- 



THE FOEAGE 81 

ever, to plow up alfalfa when for any reason 
the stand becomes thin, and to rotate it with corn 
or other crops before reseeding. 

130. Alfalfa bacteria. *' Where can I get al- 
falfa bacteria to use with the seed when sowing 
and do you think inoculation necessary to suc- 
cess ? The soil is sandy. Where should I send 
a sample of soil to have it analyzed to know what 
crops will do best and how much soil should I 
send?" — Woodward county. Western Okla- 
homa. The only reliable place from which to 
obtain alfalfa bacteria is from a good field of 
alfalfa where the roots have an abundance of 
nodules on them. If you will sow about one 
hundred pounds to the acre of soil from such 
a field on the land which you expect to put to 
alfalfa, you will have done all of the inoculating 
which you can do. Artificial inoculation is not 
at all necessary to success with alfalfa on suit- 
able soils in your county. The best analysis is 
to prepare the land and sow the alfalfa. No 
soil analysis will tell, for practical purposes, 
what crops will do best. One thing which your 
sandy soil needs is humus and you can obtain 
this by growing cowpeas and plowing them 
under as preparation of the soil for alfalfa. 
If the cowpeas are plowed under during the 
early fall, the land can be got into good shape 
for spring seeding. 

131. Seed testing. '* Where can I have alfalfa 
seed examined to find out what weed seed it cop- 



82 SUEE FEED CROPS 

tains and wliat percent, of the alfalfa seed will 
grow?'' — Baylor county, Texas. You should 
send an ounce sample of the alfalfa seed to the 
Experiment Station, College Station, Texas. It 
takes about ten days to do this work and there 
should be no charge for it. Kansas farmers 
should send samples to the Experiment Sta- 
tion, Manhattan, Kansas ; Oklahoma farmers to 
the Experiment Station, Stillwater, Oklahoma; 
Arkansas farmers to the Experiment Station, 
Fayetteville, Arkansas. 

132. Cultivating alfalfa. '^For cultivating al- 
falfa, is the spike-tooth disk the best at all 
times, or is the common disk better sometimes, 
especially when grass is coming up? Please 
tell when and how to cultivate it to get best re- 
sults." — Gariield county. Central Oklahoma. 
The spike-tooth disk harrow is more satisfac- 
tory tlian the solid disk harrow for cultivating 
alfalfa and cleaning out the grass. As a rule, 
alfalfa should be cultivated in March just as 
growth is starting and after each cutting if 
thought necessary. The disking should not be 
heavy, especially until after the alfalfa is two 
years old. Good work can be done with a 
weighted smoothing harrow. 

133. Johnson grass and alfalfa. **Ihave some 
Johnson grass on overflow land. Could I sow 
alfalfa on the ground and kill the Johnson 
grass? Sowing it to alfalfa is the easiest way 
I can manage it if the overflow will not kill the 



THE FORAGE 83 

alfalfa. Will it do it r'— Kay county, Central 
Oklahoma. It is not at all certain that alfalfa 
will kill out Johnson grass under all conditions, 
though it has disposed of some thin stands. A 
good stand of alfalfa will withstand a con- 
siderable amount of overflow as long as the 
water keeps moving. If the water stands 
quietly on alfalfa for much longer than twenty- 
four hours, the alfalfa is usually killed. 

134. Breaking a crust. ^^If a hard rain should 
come after seeding and make a crust, should 
this be harrowed or will the alfalfa break the 
crust and come through? How soon after al- 
falfa comes up should I use the harrow and will 
it pay me to get an alfalfa disk harrow ? If so, 
how soon should I use it?'' — Pottawatomie 
county. Central Oklahoma. If a heavy rain 
forms a crust immediately after sowing alfalfa, 
there is little that can be done to overcome the 
difficulty. It is not safe to harrow, as the al- 
falfa seed will have germinated and the stand 
will likely be lost. About all that can be done 
is to hope for a shower that will moisten the 
crust and let the alfalfa out. Alfalfa should not 
be harrowed until it is about a year old. On 
many soils, it is not necessary to cultivate al- 
falfa. When the soil becomes compacted by 
pasturing or when crabgrass gets started, a 
spike-tooth disk harrow is needed. 

135. Thickening thin alfalfa. **How can I 
get a better stand of alfalfa after it has been 



84 SURE FEED CEOPS 

seeded three years! It is thin in spots." — 
Payne county, Central Oklahoma. It is very 
difficult to thicken a stand of alfalfa after it 
is more than one year old. If seed is sown, the 
little plants are shaded out by the larger ones 
which are well established and draw heavily 
upon the moisture in the soil. If the stand is 
too thin to give profitable yields of hay, the best 
thing to do is to plow it up and reseed. 

'^I sowed twenty-eight acres of alfalfa 
March 23, 1911. The weeds and dry weather 
killed it in spots. Can I sow more seed in the 
spring of 1912 and hope to thicken my stand? 
There is a fine season in the ground and it is 
loose and mellow on top. I would have re- 
sowed in the fall of 1911 but the land was too 
dry." — Tillman county, Western Oklahoma. 
You now have your last chance to thicken this 
thin stand of alfalfa. Five to ten pounds of 
alfalfa seed per acre should be drilled or broad- 
casted and harrowed in early March. This will 
give the alfalfa a chance to catch up with that 
which is older, and while you may not be en- 
tirely successful, the chances are that the stand 
will be improved. 

''On the first of October, I sowed ten acres 
of alfalfa. The freeze in November killed out 
one-third of it. The ground is in fine condi- 
tion. Will it do to harrow lightly and sow again 
in March, not using as much seed, then harrow 
again after sowing?" — Tulsa county. Eastern 
Oklahoma. This plan of thickening thin alfalfa 



THE FORAGE 85 

is exactly right. It may not be necessary to 
harrow before sowing unless there is a crust 
on the soil. 

136. Alfalfa and crabgrass. **I plowed some 
wheat stubble last summer and the crabgrass 
came up on it about knee high. Will it be best 
to plow again for seeding to alfalfa in the 
spring, or could I burn the grass off, and get a 
better and firmer seed bed by harrowing I It 
wasn't plowed very deep.'' — Rogers county, 
Eastern Oklahoma. The land should be put to 
some spring crop such as oats, rather than to 
attempt to get it ready for spring seeding to 
alfalfa with so much crabgrass in the soil. The 
erabsrass will almost certainly come up and 
crowd out the alfalfa. You missed an excellent 
chance when you failed to cultivate this land 
and keep the crabgrass down last fall. Plow 
this land as early as possible and sow it to 
oats. Disk the oats stubble immediately after 
the crop is cut and plow deep as soon as pos- 
sible. Keep harrowing and allow no weeds or 
grass to become established. Sow to alfalfa 
between August 15 and September 20, as soon 
as there is enough moisture in the soil to germi- 
nate the seed and sustain the plants for a month 
without rain. 

137. Water near surface. **I have sixty acres 
of good bottom land along the North Canadian 
river but some tell me that water is so close to 



86 SUEE I^EED CROPS 

the surface that it will not grow alfalfa. The 
water is from three to five feet below the sur- 
face. I have some sub-irrigated land which is 
higher, but is sandy, a dark red color. ' ' — ^AVood- 
ward county. Western Oklahoma. If the water 
never gets closer to the surface than three feet, 
you will be able to establish alfalfa and main- 
tain it profitably for several years. If, during 
a very wet season, the water should come to the 
surface of the soil and stay there for any length 
of time, the alfalfa will be killed. Usually, it is 
well for water to be not closer than five to ten 
feet from the surface of land where alfalfa is 
sown. 

138. Poisoning gophers. '^I would like to 
know of some sure and simple way of getting 
rid of gophers in alfalfa.'' — Okfuskee county, 
Eastern Oklahoma. Get some raisins, cut a 
little slit in each raisin and insert a small crys- 
tal of strychnine sulphate. Keep these pois- 
oned raisins in a can where there is no possi- 
bility of the children getting them. Take a 
sharp pointed stick (it is better if shod with 
iron) and punch holes between two fresh gopher 
mounds until the runway is located. Drop in 
a poisoned raisin and plug the hole with a clod. 
Do this all over the field where gophers are at 
work and level off the mounds so that new 
ones may easily be seen. After about a week, 
repeat the operation, and if the work has been 



THE FORAGE 87 

done carefully, that will be the finish of the 
gophers for quite a while. Whenever any show 
up, give them another dose. 

139. Dodder in alfalfa. ^^ Will you please tell 
me how to detect the presence of dodder in 
growing alfalfa? I have inquired of a dozen 
alfalfa men and could not find one who had ever 
seen any of it. What does it look like I We 
may have it and not know it. ' ^ — Grant county, 
Central Oklahoma. The presence of dodder is 
shown by yellowish patches in the alfalfa field. 
When examined, the yellowish color will be 
found to be due to a vine which twines about 
the stems of the alfalfa and seems to have no 
connection with the soil. If at the right stage, 
the vines will be producing seed pods. On 
opening them you will find seed quite similar 
to alfalfa seed in appearance. These seeds 
germinate in the soil and after the dodder plants 
come up, they attach themselves to the alfalfa 
and live off the juices of the alfalfa plants, 
thus weakening and killing them. The way to 
kill dodder is to kill it. This can be best done 
by piling straw on the patches where dodder 
appears and burning it. If the patches are very 
small, they may be killed out by cutting and 
carefully removing the alfalfa plants to which 
the dodder has become attached, being very 
.careful not to drop any dodder seed. 

.140. Curing alfalfa hay. ^^How should I 
handle alfalfa hay from the time it is cut to 



88 SURE FEED CROPS 

keep it from coming out of the mow musty and 
moldy?''— Kay county, Central Oklahoma. If 
alfalfa hay, as soon as it is well wilted, is turned 
into windrows with a side delivery rake and 
allowed to cure there until no juice can be 
squeezed out of the stems by tightly twisting a 
bunch of them, there should be no trouble from 
the hay becoming musty in the mow. There are 
those who say they put alfalfa hay into the 
mow green and pay no attention to whether or 
not it is dry enou2:h ; but the average individual 
with human limitations will find it desirable and 
necessary to have alfalfa hay as dry as it can 
be got, without losing leaves in handling, be- 
fore storing it away. 

141. Irrigating alfalfa. *'I have forty acres 
of alfalfa land which can be irrigated by rais- 
ing the water about twentv feet. Will it pay to 
irrigate it? When should the water be turned 
on a seed crop of alfalfa and how long should 
the water remain on?" — Kay county, Central 
Oklahoma. It is entirely practicable to pump 
water to a height of twenty feet for the irriga- 
tion of alfalfa. A gasoline engine and a cen- 
trifugal pump will lift water that high economi- 
cally. Alfalfa should be irrigated immediately 
after cutting and removing the hay. An irriga- 
tion of one to two inches at this time should be 
sufficient to produce a crop of hay and often 
no irrigation at all is necessary in your county. 
Ordinarily, there is too much moisture in the 



THE FORAGE 89 

soil for the production of a first class seed crop 
in Kay county and irrigation for this purpose 
in a dry season should be very light. 

142. Turkestan alfalfa. ^^I should like your 
opinion on trying to grow Turkestan alfalfa on 
some of our uplands. I have grown alfalfa on 
upland very successfully by specially preparing 
the land and fertilizing heavily. Is there any 
difference in the feeding value of Turkestan 
and common alfalfa ? ^ ' — Cleveland county, Cen- 
tral Oklahoma. It will not be profitable for 
you to waste time with the variety of alfalfa 
called Turkestan. Trials of it in Oklahoma 
have shown that it does not produce as well as 
alfalfa which has become acclimated to Okla- 
homa conditions. The best alfalfa seed for 
you to sow on uplands is seed produced on 
similar soils in your locality, if it can be ob- 
tained. There is practically no difference in 
the feeding value of the two varieties, but there 
is considerable differeuce in the yield and it is 
in favor of your locally grown alfalfa. 

143. Alfalfa in Arkansas. ^*I have seven 
acres of bottom land which I want to sow to 
alfalfa. It is of a black, waxey, wet nature. It 
was sowed to wheat last fall. Will it do for al- 
falfa? Can I sow it in the spring and harrow 
it in with the wheat T' — Boone county, Arkan- 
sas. You will not have one chance in ten of 
obtaining a stand of alfalfa if you sow it with 
wheat in the spring. Land naturally wet is not 



90 SURE FEED CROPS 

adapted to alfalfa growing unless it is drained 
so that water never rises closer than five feet 
from the surface, and preferably never closer 
than ten feet. If the soil is suitable, it should be 
plowed as soon as wheat is harvested and har- 
rowed thoroughly until the seed bed is well 
settled. Twenty pounds of alfalfa seed should 
be sown to the acre at any time after August 
1st that the soil is filled with moisture. 

^^I have a field of bottom land which is a 
loose, sandy, level loam. I am tliinldng of try- 
ing alfalfa. We are living on the James Fork 
bottom and no one is growing alfalfa around 
here. Do you think it is worth trying?'' — Se- 
bastian county, Arkansas. If the land is well 
drained, it most certainly will grow alfalfa 
profitably, provided it is not subject to pro- 
longed overflow. It certainly is well worth try- 
ing. In your locality, it may be well to apply 
lime or ground limestone to the soil before sow- 
ing alfalfa. 

144. Measuring" stacked hay. *^Can you give 
me a good rule to measure hay in the stack when 
well settled?" — Alfalfa county. Western Okla- 
homa. The following is one of the usual rules : 
To determine the number of cubic feet in a stack 
of hay, measure the distance from the ground on 
one side of the stack to the ground on the other 
side. Subtract the width of the stack from this. 
Divide the remainder by the height of the stack. 
Multiply this figure by the distance from the, 



THE FOEAGE 91 

ground on one side of the stack to the ground on 
the other side; then multiply by the width; then 
multiply by the length; and then multiply by 
0.225. This will give the number of cubic feet. 
Divide this by 380, the average number of cubic 
feet in a ton of well settled hay, and you will 
have the number of tons in the stack, as nearly 
as it is possible to estimate it. 

145. Grades of alfalfa hay. The following is 
the classification adopted by the National Hay 
Association in 1905 : 

^^ Choice Alfalfa — Shall be reasonably fine, 
leafy alfalfa, of bright green color, properly 
cured, sound, sweet, and well baled. 

^^No. 1 Alfalfa — Shall be coarse alfalfa of 
bright green color, or reasonably fine, leafy, of 
good color, and may contain five percent, of for- 
eign grasses; must be well baled, sound, and 
sweet. 

*^No. 2 Alfalfa— Shall include alfalfa some- 
what bleached, but of fair color, reasonably 
leafy, not more than one-eighth foreign grasses, 
sound and well baled. 

^'No. 3 Alfalfa— Shall include bleached al- 
falfa, or alfalfa mixed with not to exceed one- 
fourth foreign grasses, but when mixed must be 
of fair color, sound, and well baled. 

'^No Grade Alfalfa— Shall include all alfalfa 
not good enough for other grades, caked, musty, 
grassy, or threshed.'' 

146. The best market for alfalfa hay is good 



92 SURE FEED CROPS 

livestock on the farm which produced it. Dis- 
cussing this point, Director Webster of the Kan- 
sas Agricultural Experiment Station said: 
**We are not getting what we should from our 
alfalfa. Located as we are, we have naturally 
come to making alfalfa a commercial crop. We 
have mills which grind alfalfa which, with the 
baled crop, is shipped to other states in amazing 
amounts. Kansas farmers cannot afford to 
sell their alfalfa outside of the state. If the 
eastern feeder, who is glad to get our alfalfa at 
three times the price we get for it, can put it 
into his barn for feed and sell the finished pro- 
duct profitably, then the Kansas farmer is los- 
ing the difference when he might as well be 
putting the finished product on the market him- 
self.'' 

147. The best alfalfa mill is good livestock 
which can grind alfalfa hay more economically 
than any machine which has yet been built. The 
business of milling alfalfa is coming to be a 
profitable adjunct to the business of millin<r 
wheat, kafircorn, and other grains. There is 
where it belongs. The livestock markets at 
Kansas City, Wichita, Oklahoma City, and 
Fort Worth furnish the places where farmers 
of the Central Southwest may market the only 
alfalfa mills likely to bring them a profit — the 
fat cattle and hogs and livestock products. In- 
vestments in good livestock are many times 
more likely to pay profits than are investments 



THE FOBAGE 93 

in beautifully engraved certificates of stock in 
alfalfa mills, whether paid for in cash or in 
alfalfa hay. 

148. Judicious pasturing of alfalfa is profit- 
able. Alfalfa less than a year old should not be 
pastured at all ; it needs at least that much time 
for getting well established. Alfalfa is a hay 
crop rather than a pasture crop. But pasturing 
combined with the production of hay may be 
made to give the greatest profits. If possible 
to avoid it, alfalfa should not be pastured so 
heavily that two to three good cuttings of hay 
are not produced each season, in addition to 
the pasture. Heavy pasturing makes the stand 
thin and gives grass and weeds a chance to be- 
come established. 

149. In the spring, when growth is starting, 
one month of heavy pasturing may damage a 
stand of alfalfa more than pasturing it heavily 
the other eleven months. The plants must have 
a chance to recuperate. If the leaves are nipped 
off as rapidly as they appear when growth 
starts in the spring, the plants are discouraged 
and the weaker ones die. If stock are taken off 
by March 1st, and the alfalfa is given a good 
cultivation, with an alfalfa cultivator or a 
smoothing harrow heavily weighted, the plants 
will be strengthened and will start into vigor- 
ous growth when warm days come. The bac- 
teria in the nodules on alfalfa roots can get no 
nitrogen from the air unless air gets into the 



94 SURE FEED CROPS 

soil, A cultivation which will loosen the sur- 
face soil without doing damage to the plants 
should be given at least once a year to all al- 
falfa which is pastured. The egg cases of grass- 
hoppers will be thrown out and destroyed. 
Moisture will be saved to push the growth of 
the crop instead of being permitted to evaporate 
from the compacted surface. 

150. Hogs pastured on alfalfa will make more 
profitable growth if fed a ration of kafircorn, 
milomaize, or corn in addition to the pasture. It 
is possible to maintain hogs on alfalfa pasture 
alone, but it is not possible to finish them for 
market without the feeding of grain. The Ne- 
braska Experiment Station has thoroughly in- 
vestigated the uses of alfalfa in feeding hogs. 
In one experiment, four lots of ten pigs each, 
averaging about 75 pounds, were pastured on 
alfalfa. One lot received no corn, the other lots 
ate respectively 1.33, 2.48, and 3.46 pounds of 
corn per pig per day. The daily gains per pig 
in each of the four lots during a period of sixty 
days were 0.02, 0.34, 0.63, and 0.85 pounds. Fig- 
uring the alfalfa pasture at $2 per acre for each 
lot and corn at market prices, thirty cents per 
bushel, the cost of 100 pounds of gain for the 
different lots was: $14.30; $2.74; $2.45; and 
$2.43. Many with a considerable acreage of 
alfalfa have made the mistake of raising more 
hogs on alfalfa than they could obtain grain to 
finish. This has happened several times, es- 



THE FORAGE 95 

pecially in localities which have depended upon 
growing corn and have not planted good acre- 
ages of those sure grain crops, kafircorn and 
milomaize. Except scabby ears on thin-skinned 
shoats allowed to run in wet alfalfa, there is 
rarely trouble of any sort from pasturing al- 
falfa with hogs. This should be treated with a 
solution of one of the coal tar dips used accord- 
ing to directions on the package. 

151. Bloat of cattle sometimes results when 
they are first turned on alfalfa pasture or when 
it is wet. A mixed stand of alfalfa and crab- 
grass or other grasses is more satisfactory as 
cattle pasture than a first class stand of alfalfa. 
While many pasture both horses and cattle on 
alfalfa with profitable returns and few or no 
losses, the first purpose and greatest value of 
alfalfa is not for pasture. Those who grow the 
crop successfully for hay may work into pas- 
turing gradually. But those who expect to grow 
it for pasture as the first consideration are not 
likely to find it satisfactory. 

152. In composition and actual feeding value, 
a ton of good alfalfa hay is fully the equal of 
1600 pounds of wheat bran. One hundred 
pounds of alfalfa hay contain 11.1 pounds of 
digestible protein, 39.1 pounds of digestible car- 
bohydrates, and 0.6 pounds digestible fat. One 
hundred pounds of wheat bran contain 11.9 
pounds digestible protein, 42.0 pounds digest- 
ible carbohydrates, and 2.5 pounds digestible 



96 SURE FEED CROPS 

fat. For all practical purposes, results from 
feeding alfalfa in combination with other feeds 
will be entirely satisfactory if practically the 
same methods are used as are customary when 
feeding wheat bran. No one experienced in 
feeding would think of giving any animal noth- 
ing but bran; neither should they have nothing 
but alfalfa but, because of its bulkiness, the ex- 
clusive feeding of a]falfa is not as harmful as 
the exclusive feeding of bran would be. All 
animals fed alfalfa should also be fed ground 
kafircorn or milomaize or Indian corn. There 
is no need for buying and feeding bran, shorts, 
or cottonseed meal when alfalfa hay is on hand. 
Whenever a ton of alfalfa hay sells for less than 
the cost of 1600 pounds of bran, alfalfa is the 
cheaper feed for every kind of farm livestock. 

153. The fertilizer constituents in a ton of al- 
falfa hay are 49.4 pounds nitrogen, 35.8 pounds 
potash, and 12.2 pounds phosphoric acid. If 
bought in the form of commercial fertilizers, 
this will cost at least $9.80. When alfalfa hay 
is soldj even at fifteen dollars per ton, two- 
thirds of the cash received is drawn from the 
supply of fertility of the farm which produced 
it. It is true that a large part of the nitrogen 
of alfalfa is taken from the air through the 
work of the bacteria in the nodules on the roots. 
But the potash and the phosphoric acid all 
comes from the soil, much of it being drawn 
from the subsoil at depths not reached by other 
crops. Sold at the usual prices, this fertility is 



THE FOEAGE 97 

given to the lands of others. Fed on the farms 
which produce it, alfalfa hay builds the fertility 
of the soil and makes possible increasing yields 
of other crops. Sold, alfalfa is a soil robber; 
fed, it is a soil enricher. The man who grows 
alfalfa and sells the hay is wasting his patri- 
mony without getting even the questionable 
pleasure of riotous living out of it. 

154. For horses, alfalfa hay is an entirely 
satisfactory and valuable feed if used with any 
degree of judgment. Keeping in mind the fact 
that in composition, alfalfa hay is practically 
the same as bran, only limited amounts should 
be fed at first. Alfalfa hay should not be fed 
alone to work horses and brood mares, any 
more than bran should be fed alone. When al- 
falfa hay is fed, the grain ration may consist 
entirely of kafircorn, milomaize, or corn, and 
other hay should be fed, at least until the horses 
become entirely accustomed to alfalfa. The 
amount of alfalfa fed per day to a horse should 
be limited to ten to fifteen pounds. In regions 
of heavy alfalfa production, no other hay than 
alfalfa is fed and fine horses are produced. 
Many breeders of pure-bred Percherons make 
large use of alfalfa as feed for their brood 
mares, colts, and stallions. 

155. Cattle feeding offers a field for the profit- 
able utilization of large amounts of alfalfa hay. 
The proper production and use of kafircorn, 
milomaize, and alfalfa in beef production by the 



98 SURE FEED CROPS 

farmers of the Central Southwest will make this 
region practically independent of drouth. The 
use of alfalfa hay in connection with these 
grains in fattening steers has already been dis- 
cussed (26). Steers on full feed of ground 
kaiircorn or milomaize will consume from ten 
to fifteen pounds of alfalfa hay per day per 
head. ^ Stock cattle may be maintained and will 
keep in good condition on alfalfa hay, either 
alone or with but little grain. Alfalfa hay dam- 
aged by rain should never be destroyed; it 
never gets so badly spoiled that cattle will not 
eat it. 

156. In the dairy ration, alfalfa effects a great 
saving in the cost of production (27). Alfalfa 
may constitute the entire hay ration of dairy 
cows being fed liberally on ground kafircorn or 
milomaize. Under farm conditions, when al- 
falfa hay is produced, there is no need of pur- 
chasing bran, shorts, or cottonseed meal for 
dairy cattle. With cows producing large 
amounts of milk, and requiring correspondingly 
large quantities of feed, some of these concen- 
trated feeds may be used to replace a portion 
of the more bulky alfalfa hay. 

157. Feeding hay to hogs is regarded as some- 
thing of a joke by those uninformed as to the 
value of alfalfa hay in reducing the cost of the 
production of pork. But for many years, prac- 
tical feeders have used large amounts of alfalfa 
with profit in hog feeding. The Nebraska Agri- 



THE FORAGE 99 

cultural Experiment Station has reported the 
results of numerous experiments in hog feeding 
where alfalfa was a part of the ration. The 
most satisfactory ration, judged from the profit 
made per hog fattened, was corn and all of the 
alfalfa hay, fed from the rack, that the hogs 
would eat. This method turned off more net 
profit than when the alfalfa was chopped or 
ground to meal before feeding. The conclusions 
are: ''After studying, for several years, the 
problem of feeding alfalfa hay to hogs, we 
would recommend the following: 

''Feed a good quality of fourth cutting if 
possible. If this cannot be obtained, feed the 
finest and brightest hay possible. 

"Feed the hay in a rack from which it may 
be eaten easily, or feed twice or three times 
daily, on hard soil or on a feeding floor, throw- 
ing aside the refuse left over from the last feed. 

"Give the hogs an abundance of alfalfa. Do 
not try to make them eat the coarse stems. Ther 
^/i^S^* coi'^ ill preference and not eat as much 
alfalfa as is desirable. Feed the coarse stems 
to the cattle and horses." (29.) 
^ 158. For poultry feeding, alfalfa is coming 
into increasing use. The leaves are used in 
making mixtures cf feed for growing poultry 
and laying hci^c. The protein of the alfalfa fur- 
nishes a portion cJ the nitrogenous material re- 
quired for the formation of the albumen of the 
eggs. Alfalfa pastures for poultry are also 
coming into use. 



100 SURE FEED CROPS 

159. Bee-keeping is a most profitable adjunct 
to alfalfa raising; profitable to the beekeeper in 
the production of excellent honey and to the 
alfalfa grower in the more perfect fertilization 
of the seed crop. 

COWPEAS 

160. Cowpeas in the south have for many 
years been grown quite extensively. Those who 
have come from the humid southern states to 
farm under the semi-arid conditons of the Cen- 
tral Southwest have found it necessary to make 
many changes from their accustomed methods 
of cropping. The common practice of sowing 
cowpeas among the corn, which brings profit- 
able results in the Atlantic coast states, is not 
satisfactory here. Cowpeas pay better when 
handled, at least in part, as a real crop instead 
of as a catch crop. 

161. Cowpeas replace clover in crop rotations 
here. Farmers from northern states, accus- 
tomed to growing clover, have found the crop 
unprofitable in the southwest. As they have 
learned to make use of cowpeas instead of 
clover, they have found that cowpeas will do 
as much in the way of soil improvement and 
the production of feed in four months as clover 
will do in eighteen months, even under con- 
ditions most favorable for the growth of clover. 
A realization of this fact in the northern states, 
even where clover does well, is causing a more 



THE FORAGE 101 

extended use of cowpeas and a reduction of the 
clover acreage on many farms. Cowpeas obtain 
from the air a portion of the nitrogen required 
for their growth. The same is true of clover 
and it is this feature which makes the crop of 
value in the maintenance of soil fertility. 

162. On upland soils, not well suited to the 
production of alfalfa, cowpeas may be grown 
and will supply feed fully the equal of alfalfa 
hay for all purposes. From cowpea hay and 
kafircorn or milomaize, rations may be provided 
for cattle, horses, and hogs fully equal in ability 
to produce profitable results with rations com- 
posed of alfalfa hay and corn. These sure feed 
crops make it possible for farmers on relatively 
poor soils to engage in stock raising with the 
certainty of profit. 

163. Cowpeas require cultivation and, in 
regions with limited rainfall, rarely produce 
profitable crops when broadcasted or drilled 
thickly. Land to be planted to cowpeas should 
have good preparation, the same as for any 
other real crop. Usually, the rows should be 
the standard width, forty-two inches apart. In 
locations with plenty of moisture, they are 
sometimes ** double-rowed'' when planted with 
a two-row corn planter, making the rows 
twenty-one inches apart. This is too close, how- 
ever, for satisfactory cultivation or for cer- 
tainty of yields in dry seasons. 



102 SUEE FEED CROPS 

164. A crop of cowpeas should be grown at 
least once in three years on all cultivated land. 
The crops grown will determine where cow- 
peas can most profitably be worked into the ro- 
tation. This will be indicated to some degree in 
what follows. Continuous planting of any one 
crop on the soil, without a change, inevitably 
results in decreased yields. If the chief crop 
is^ wheat, a portion of the stubble should be 
disked as the wheat is cut and planted to cow- 
peas in shallow furrows, this land to be planted 
to oats, kafireorn, or milomaize the following 
spring. If cotton is the principal crop, not all 
of the cotton land should be replanted to cotton 
the following spring. Instead, part of it should 
be planted to sure feed crops, among which cow- 
peas should be included. 

165. Alternate rows of cowpeas and kafir- 
eorn, or milomaize furnish a practicable way of 
growing these crops, insuring good yields, and 
at the same time keeping up the soil's fertility. 
The kafireorn, for example, is planted at the 
usual time for the locality, but the rows are put 
seven feet apart. After a cultivation or two 
with the harrow or cultivator, and perhaps a 
month later, cowpeas are planted in the middle 
of the seven-foot strip between the kafireorn 
rows. After the kafireorn gets too big to 
straddle with the cultivator, cultivation of the 
cowpeas should be continued. The following 
year, the rows should be reversed, kafireorn 



THE FOEAGE 103 

being planted in the rows where the cowpeas 
grew the previous year. 

166. A peck of cowpea seed to the acre is 
enough. Cowpea seed are usually high in price, 
ranging from $1.50 to $3.50 per bushel and even 
higher at the close of the planting season. 
Thickly planted, cowpeas will make but poor 
growth in a dry season. If thinly planted, 
there will be plants enough in a dry season and 
these will grow large enough to occupy the 
space in wet seasons. Many failures with cow- 
peas have been caused by planting them too 
thickly. A peck to the acre is always enougn. 
At that rate of seeding, the cost of seed per 
acre is light. 

167. The soil should be warm before cowpeas 
are planted. The seed quickly rots if placed in 
a wet, cold soil. They germinate quickly with 
proper conditions of warmth and moisture. In 
Oklahoma, May 1st in the southern part of the 
state, and June 1st along the northern border, 
are the earliest dates for planting cowpeas. 
The early varieties furnish the earliest grain 
pasture for hogs. To make sure of a crop, the 
planting should be completed if possible by 
July 1, though fair yields are sometimes ob- 
tained from planting as late as July 15. Usually, 
there is not enough moisture to give the crop 
a good start if planting is delayed until July. 

168. As a catch crop, planted on wheat or 
oats stubble, cowpeas are not always certain 



104 SURE FEED CROPS 

to pay. Unless there is abundant moisture in 
June and the crop is put in early, a dry July 
may make the crop a complete failure. In 
favorable years, however, good crops have been 
raised by planting cowpeas into disked stubble 
land. Cotton sometimes fails to make a stand. 
Late replanting is rarely profitable, but there 
is usually time to plant cowpeas after the cotton 
has been abandoned. Early potatoes should be 
followed by a crop of cowpeas instead of by a 
second crop of potatoes. Wherever a crop has 
been removed in time or there is a vacant patch 
of land in June, it should be put to use growing 
cowpeas instead of being permitted to grow up 
to weeds. 

169. For green manuring, to be plowed under 
for soil improvement, cowpeas are a profitable 
crop. They should be turned under when the 
plant is at the highest stage of growth, just 
before it begins maturing. This will actually 
add to the supply of plant food in the soil, some 
of the nitrogen of the plants being obtained 
from the air through the action of the bacteria 
in the nodules on the cowpea roots. The vege- 
table matter after it decays will also improve 
the soil and make it work better. If the soil 
is sandy, the soil grains will be held together 
by the decayed cowpeas and will have less of 
a tendency to blow. If the soil is tough and 
pasty, it will be loosened to some extent and 
work better. As a rule, land where cowpeas 
have been turned under in August or September 



THE FORAGE 105 

should not be sowed to wheat or alfalfa in the 
fall but should instead be planted to crops the 
next spring. It takes time for the material to 
decay and the soil to settle to a good seed bed. 
Wheat may be sown on land from which a crop 
of early cowpeas has been pastured off or cut 
for hay. 

170. Good feed is wasted, however, when a 
crop of cowpeas is plowed under. It is more 
profitable to get their full feeding value, if pos- 
sible, and put the resulting manure on the land. 
Cattle may be pastured on cowpeas with profit 
if care to prevent bloat is taken when they are 
first turned in. They should be turned in at 
first in the evening for a short time until they 
become accustomed to the large supply of rich 
feed. Hogs often do not pasture satisfactorily 
on cowpeas, especially if turned in before any 
of the pods have ripened. They may dig up and 
eat the roots, leaving the tops to waste. But 
there is no more economical way of harvesting 
a cowpea crop than by pasturing it with hogs 
after most of the pods have matured. Gains 
will be better if they have a light feed of ground 
kafircorn or milomaize to balance the ration 
while pasturing on the cowpeas. Even after the 
vines have been killed by frost, horses and 
cattle will continue eating them and hogs will 
gather the seed. 

171. Cowpeas for hay should be cut before 
the bottom leaves begin drying, while still 



106 SUEE EEED CEOPS 

blooming at the top but after the pods have 
begun ripening at the bottom. Cultivation of 
cowpeas to be cut for hay should be such as to 
leave the land level and free from ridges. The 
crop is usually cut with a mower but, if the 
grain is ripened, this shatters much of it. Better 
work can be done with the mower by using an 
extension on the guards to lift the vines. The 
roots may be cut off with a sharp plow with the 
moldboard removed, or with a sharp iron prop- 
erly bent and attached to a plow beam. As 
with alfalfa, the curing is best effected by keep- 
ing the leaves alive and transpiring water for 
as long a time as possible after cutting. After 
wilting in the swath, the curing should be con- 
tinued in the windrow and, if necessary, in 
small piles. The more thoroughly cowpea hay 
can be cured without losing its leaves, the 
better the condition in which it will come out 
of the mow or stack. Cattle will eat badly dam- 
aged cowpea hay but its feeding qualities are 
not improved by its having become mouldy or 
blackened. 

172. The feeding value of cowpea hay for all 
farm purposes is essentially the same as that 
of alfalfa hay. (152.) It varies widely, de- 
pending upon the amount of matured grain 
which it contains and the percentage of leaves 
lost during the curing. Cowpeas contain 16.8 
percent, digestible protein, 54.9 percent, diges- 
tible carbohydrates, and 1.1 percent, digestible 
fat. The hay, without the grain, contains 5.8 



THE FOEAGE 107 

percent, digestible protein, 39.3 percent, diges- 
tible carbohydrates, and 1.3 percent, digestible 
fat. For horses, dairy cattle, and fattening 
steers and hogs, cowpea hay may be used for 
every purpose that alfalfa hay can be used and 
the results will be practically the same. It is a 
rich feed, difficult at times to care for and cure 
properly, but one which should be grown and 
fed much more extensively as one of the sure 
feed crops adapted to Central Southwestern 
conditions. 

173. Varieties. Numerous varieties of cow- 
peas are grown. The Whippoorwill is the most 
common, though different types are often sold 
under this name. It is a variety which produces 
a good growth of vine and a fair yield of seed. 
W. P. Camp of Washita county, Western Okla- 
homa, has made variety tests of cowpeas and 
sums up their general adaptabilities as fol- 
lows: 

For hay— Whippoorwill, Iron, New Era, War- 
ren's New Hybrid, Red Crowder. 

For seed— Michigan Favorite, Whippoorwill, 
Groit, Brabham. 

For quick maturity— New Era, Warren's 
Extra Early, Michigan Favorite, Whippoorwill. 

For slow maturity— Red Ripper, King, Un- 
known, Clay. 

For heavy vines— Unknown, Rep Ripper, 
King, Clay, Brown Crowder. One early and one 
late variety are desirable on every farm. 



108 SURE FEED CROPS 

174. Cowpea seed are usually high in price 
because of the labor necessary to save the seed. 
The ripe pods are picked by hand, children usu- 
ally doing the work. These are later either 
hulled with machinery or flailed out. Small 
hullers, run by hand or a gasoline engine, do 
satisfactory work. Some seed is saved by stor- 
ing hay containing ripe seed in mows with tight 
floors. As the hay is fed cut, the seed are shaken 
down and later cleaned off of the floor. Special 
cowpea threshers which thresh the grain from 
the entire plant without cracking the seed are 
now coming into more general use. Grain 
threshers do not do satisfactory work with cow- 
peas. Thev crack too large a proportion and 
spoil them for seed. 

175. Weevil damage in cowpea seed is a fre- 
quent source of loss. This may be prevented by 
placing the cowpeas in a tight bin or box and 
putting in with them, in open dishes or by pour- 
ing through a pipe into the middle of the pile, 
one pound of carbon bi-sulphide for each thirty 
bushels of grain. The bin should be kept tightly 
covered and fire should be kept away until the 
odor disappears. This treatment will kill the 
weevils and similar treatment two weeks to a 
month afterward will kill any others which may 
have hatched out. Another method consists in 
putting the cowpeas in an air-tight bin, then fill 
a number of small bottles with carbon bi-sul- 
phide, cutting a notch in the stopper of each. 



THE FORAGE 109 

Set these bottles in the cowpeas and let them 
keep Tip continuous treatment for weevil. 

176. Practical experience is necessary to 
adapt the cowpea crop to varying soil condi- 
tions. An excellent illustration of this is fur- 
nished by the following report from P. E. Slack 
of Major county, Western Oklahoma: 

** A few years ago, I became a convert to the 
planting of cowpeas and although I have had 
some partial failures, I have never become a 
backslider. My farm is in the blackjacks and 
the soil is very sandy. I cut the cowpeas with 
a cutter and the fields being left bare of vegeta- 
tion, how that soil did blow! I had to dig my 
wire fences out of the sand banks in the spring. 
But I realized that the fault was not with the 
cowpeas so I tried drilling the field to wheat or 
rye, merely as a cover crop after the cowpeas 
were taken off. 

'^In the summer of 1911, during the dry, 
parching weather, my field of cowpeas was a 
rich, dark green, showing no trace of dry 
weather, while the corn was parched and suf- 
fering for moisture. The soil has been im- 
proved by plowing under a green crop of rye or 
wheat every year on land which was in cowpeas 
the previous year. The soil did not blow badly 
in the spring of 1912, even with the bad dust 
storms we have had. 

'^To prepare the soil for cowpeas, I plow 
during May after the other crops are out of the 
way and the weeds have obtained a good start, 



110 SUEE FEED CEOPS 

preferably land which was in kafircorn or 
broom corn the year before, using a chain to 
wind under all weeds and trash. I follow with 
a harrow and any time in June, after a good 
rain or two has settled the soil, list shallow— 
from two and a half to three inches deep. Make 
furrows not more than three feet apart. Drill 
right after the lister so as to put the seed in 
moist earth, drilling about one peck to the acre, 
one seed each three to four inches in the row. 
^'I then cultivate two or three times, bring- 
ing the soil to the plants from the first. In 
hard land, it might be well to plow early, but 
I wish to get all the humus possible into the soil 
so prefer to plow after the weeds get a good 
start. A furrow opener attachment to a corn 
planter would be a fine thing to use in planting 
the cowpeas. I have planted cowpeas as late 
as July 15 and they fully matured a heavy crop 
of seed. I have also found that those planted 
after the middle of June remain free from 
weevil until warm weather the following season, 
while the early-planted are badly infested dur- 
ing the fall of the year in which they are grown. 
*'For cutting cowpeas, I use the following: 
Take an old plowbar and a piece of corn sled 
steel about twenty-six inches in length to the 
blacksmith shop and have the steel welded to 
the bar, at an angle of a little more than forty- 
five degrees, making the steel of knife lie nearly 
flat. Put a brace across from bar to knife. Bolt 
the bar to a riding plow or lister, and put on 



THE FOKAGE 111 

your rolling coulter with a crooked shank so as 
to cut the vines as far from the row as possible. 
If the soil is hard or dry, the lever can be set 
to cut at the surface; if loose and sandy, it 
should be set to cut under the surface. 

'*In our dry climate, I always cure cowpea 
hay in the shock, shocking immediately after 
the cutter and putting about eight rows in one 
shock row. If I can get help, I prefer shocking 
entirely by hand, as many cowpeas are lost in 
raking. In favorable weather, the crop will 
cure enough to stack in three weeks. In regions 
of greater rainfall, shocks should be made 
smaller and high and narrow. The hay will 
not shed water readily and should be stored in 
a mow or the stacks should be covered with 
some material which will shed water. 

*^I plant the Speckled Crowder exclusively, 
as it yields fully a half more seed than any other 
variety I have tried, besides yielding a heavy 
crop of hay." 

PEANUTS 

177. Peanuts earned a place among the sure 
feed crops in Oklahoma in the dry season of 
1911. The total acreage planted to this crop 
was not large but it was for the most part 
widely scattered and the returns were generally 
profitable. 

178. In Western Oklahoma, the returns from 
planting the Spanish peanut have been care- 



112 SURE .FEED CROPS 

fnlly investigated by George Bishop and tlie 
information gathered np to the fall of 1911 has 
been reported by him as follows: 

^ ^ My attention was attracted to the hardiness 
of the Spanish peamit when I fonnd a farmer 
in Western Oklahoma who had been growing 
them for several years. The first year I visited 
his farm was in 1909, and he had planted ten 
acres of peannts and ninety acres of corn. This 
turned ont to be the first of the recent series of 
dry years. The corn was planted in April and 
the peanuts on May 10. The unfavorable crop 
season cut the corn yield to thirteen bushels 
per acre, while the peanuts yielded forty bushels 
per acre. In 1910, the difference was even 
greater, though neither the corn nor the pea- 
nuts made as much as the year before. Again 
in 1911, when the corn was an entire failure, 
the peanuts endured the heat and winds until 
the rains came in July, then went on and made 
a yield of twenty-five bushels per acre. 

^^ Another field in the same locality was 
planted in alternate rows of corn and peanuts. 
This was done for the special benefit of the 
corn and not for the peanuts. The intention 
was to give the corn a wider feeding area for 
its roots at maturing time, due to the later 
planting of the peanut. The peanuts, being 
planted six or eight weeks later, would not 
naturally use their share of the moisture. This 
corn field remained green several weeks longer 
than fields adjoining, planted in the regular 



THE FOEAGE 113 

way. The corn, though using the peanuts* 
moisture for several weeks, was compelled to 
give up before rains came July 19. The peanuts 
went on and finally made a yield of fifteen 
bushels per acre. This was undoubtedly as 
severe a test as could be asked for.*' 

179. As to planting peanuts, Mr. Bishop says: 
* ^ The peanut is usually planted about or a little 
later than cotton planting time where cotton is 
grown. For Western Oklahoma and the Texas 
Panhandle, the time for planting would be from 
the tenth of May on through June. I have 
records for 1911 in latitude thirty-five of plant- 
ings, one on the tenth and another on the fif- 
teenth of July, each making and maturing good 
yields before frost. The peanut is inclined to 
be a little slow in its early growth. For this 
reason, the ground should always be warmed 
up and well prepared before the seed is planted. 
They will do better in a shallow lister furrow- 
This gives them the protection afforded by the 
furrow and the needed warmth of the surface 
soil. If a regular peanut planter is used, it is 
better to make the opening furrow as small as 
the peanut will drop into easily. The planter 
running in the bottom of the lister furrow 
makes this opening in the firm, moist soil; the 
peanut dropping into it has the benefit of sub- 
moisture from three sides and a stand is almost 
certain, rain or shine. The Eastern farmer 
drops the seed in loose, moist soil and the rains 



114 SUEE.FEED CEOPS 

come and germinate it, but the dry farmer of 
the West must place the seed in positive con- 
tact with the snb -moisture, so that he will get a 
stand, whether it rains in one week or three. 

180. ''The early cultivation of the peanut is 
practically the same as for cotton. If the land 
is weedy or crabgrassy, nothing will do quite 
as good work as a fourteen tooth harrow cul- 
tivator. They have a lever adjustment and can 
be set for the width of the lister furrow. Ee- 
move the front and back teeth and go right 
down the row, cultivating each side. If a little 
loose dirt is thrown on the peanut plants, no 
harm will be done. If a heavy rain forms a 
crust on the peanuts before they come up, the 
front and back teeth of this same harrow may 
be adjusted so as to break the crust immediately 
over the peanuts while the outside teeth serve as 
runners to prevent them from going too deep. ' * 

181. A bushel of Spanish peanuts to the acre 

will put one pod each twelve to fourteen inches 
in rows forty-two inches apart. Concerning 
preparation of seed for planting, H. M. Wolver- 
ton of Stephens county. Central Oklahoma, 
says: '^The peanuts can be soaked twenty-four 
to thirty-six hours just before planting. If the 
moles and gophers are bad in your soil, dissolve 
a five cent bar of common laundry soap in a 
gallon of boiling water and as soon as all has 
dissolved, add one pint of kerosene and stir for 



THE FORAGE 115 

ten minutes. Mix this in a barrel with enough 
cold water to soak two bushels of peanuts and 
the moles and gophers will not eat them.*' 

182. Hilling up is not necessary nor desirable, 
according to Mr. Wolverton. He says: ''The 
plant, as soon as it has a few leaves on it, begins 
to bloom and the blooms follow the growth and 
continually run the little pegs down until frost. 
I have tried hilling with a hoe and plow, also 
cultivating level, and I can tell very little^ dif- 
ference, if any, in the yield. If hay is desired, 
cultivate level all through the season, and when 
the vines beorin turning yellow, they are ripe 
and should either be mowed or dug for hay and 
peanuts. If they are to be hogged off, the hogs 
can be turned in after mowing." Clean, shallow 
cultivation, preventing the formation of a crust 
on the soil, should be continued through the 
season. 

183. Peanuts are harvested in a variety of 
ways. George Bishop, in the report previously 
referred to, says: ''Most of the peanuts which 
have been grown in the West so far have been 
harvested by hogs and for the present, this is 
undoubtedly the best plan. In a few places, 
however, peanuts are grown for market. The 
peanuts are loosened up by running the share 
of a turning plow with the moldboard removed, 
just deep enough to cut below the peanuts. The 
vines and nuts are then raked into windrows 
with a hay rake, and in a day or two, depending 



116 SURE FEED CROPS 

upon how quickly they cure, they are put into 
stacks convenient for threshing. The peanuts 
are then threshed with a special peanut thresher 
and the hay is saved for feed. The practice of 
mowing the hay and turning in the hogs to har- 
vest the peanuts is the one which appeals to me 
as the plan for the beginner. It was at first 
thought that the vines were necessary for the 
cheapest gains, as hogs eat more or less of them. 
But recent tests have shown that hogs will make 
practically the same gains when fed on peanuts 
alone and when turned on a field from which the 
vines have not been removed.'' 

184. Feeding to hogs is recommended by the 
Arkansas Experiment Station as the best 
method of disposing of peanuts. A recent pub- 
lication of that station says: ^'This method 
saves the expense of pulling and hauling, and if 
portable fences are used so that the hogs can 
graze over but a small area at a time, the waste 
of peanuts will be greatly reduced. It is generally 
considered that an acre of Spanish peanuts will 
furnish grazing for eight or ten hogs, weighing 
in the neighborhood of two hundred pounds, for 
about thirty days. However, this depends upon 
the yields, size of the hogs, and the quantity of 
other feeds fed in addition to the peanuts. For 
the best results, it is advisable to feed corn in 
addition to the peanuts. By so doing, not only 
will greater gains be secured, but a much better 
quality of pork will be produced than if the 



THE FOEAGE 117 

peanuts are fed alone. If corn is quite high in 
price, it might be more economical to produce 
the bulk of the gains on peanuts alone and 
simply finish the hogs off on corn during the 
last three weeks of the fattening period. When 
fattened on peanuts alone, a soft, oily pork is 
produced which does not generally find high 
favor upon the market.'' Ground kafircorn or 
milomaize may of course be fed instead of corn 
to hogs being fattened on peanuts. 

185. Peanuts furnish rich feed for cattle and 
other farm stock, as well as for hogs. The 
whole peanut plant, vines and nuts, contains 
18.4 percent, protein, 40.1 percent, carbohy- 
drates, and 21.5 percent, fat. Peanut hay, from 
which the peanuts have been removed, contains 
10.0 percent, protein, 42.0 percent, carbohy- 
drates, and 3.6 percent, fat. For purposes of 
direct comparison, wheat bran contains 15.4 per- 
cent, protein, 60.4 percent, carbohydrates, and 
4.0 percent, fat. Alfalfa hay contains 15.4 per- 
cent, protein, 65.8 percent, carbohydrates, and 
1.4 percent, fat. Peanut hay may be used very 
profitably in feeding all classes of cattle, the 
methods being similar to those followed in feed- 
ing alfalfa and cowpea hay. (152, 172.) The 
ration should be balanced by feeding ground 
kafircorn or milomaize whenever peanut hay is 
being fed. 

186. Markets for peanuts are certain to be 
developed as production increases. The yields 



118 SURE FEED CROPS 

run from forty to one hundred bushels per acre 
and sometimes higher. Aside from the supply 
required to take care of the demand for roasted 
and salted peanuts, the manufacture of peanut 
oil and peanut butter is increasing. Both are 
being used more extensively as human food. 
Peanut cake, from which the oil has been 
pressed, is a rich feed for livestock, containing 
47.6 percent, protein, 28.8 percent, carbohy- 
drates, and 8.0 percent, fat. The ease and profit 
with which peanuts may be disposed of by feed- 
ing to livestock, if the market is unsatisfactory, 
and the fact that, like alfalfa and cowpeas, pea- 
nuts obtain from the air a portion of the nitro- 
gen required for their growth, make this one of 
the sure feed crops to which increasing acreages 
should be planted in the Central Southwest. 



SORGHUM 

187. Sweet sorghum or cane, as it is commonly 
called, is one of the surest of feed crops. The 
season has not yet been so dry in Oklahoma 
that sorghum, planted at some time between 
April 1st and July 15th, has not produced a fair 
yield of rough feed. Unless abundant rough 
feed is assured from kafircorn fodder, alfalfa, 
cowpeas, and peanuts, a reasonable acreage of 
sorghum should be included in every season's 
planting. 

188. *'Hard on the land'' is an indictment 



THE FORAGE 119 

most frequently bronglit against sorghum. The 
ability of the crop to withstand extremes of 
drouth and still produce feed naturally carries 
with it the effect of drying the soil thoroughly 
and filling the surface soil with a mass of fibrous 
roots which decay very slowly if undisturbed. 
An ordinary crop of sorghum, amounting to 
from two to seven tons of cured sorghum hay 
per acre, also unquestionably draws heavily 
upon the supply of available plant food in the 
soil. The thorough drying of the soil by this 
crop and the failure to break up the land in the 
late fall or early winter in preparation for suc- 
ceeding crops is responsible for short yields of 
other crops following sorghum. This may in 
very large measure be overcome by following 
the same methods of soil preparation as have 
been suggested for kafircorn and milomaize. 
(12.) 

189. Rich land is needed for the production 
of heavy crops of sorghum hay, and it pays well 
to use the stable manure on land on which 
sorghum is to be grown. Thin, shallow upland 
soils should not be expected to produce profit- 
able crops of sorghum hay without heavy ma- 
nuring. The average soils of the Central South- 
west will, however, produce heavy yields of 
sorghum hay in average seasons and fair yields 
in seasons of extreme drouth. 

190. For hay, sorghum may either be broad- 
casted or put in with a grain drill, using about 



120 SURE FEED CROPS 

one bushel of seed to the acre. The land should 
be plowed and harrowed, and the better the 
preparation in advance of the time of sowing, 
the more certain the yields under unfavorable 
conditions. The sowing may be done at almost 
any time from April until July, thus making it 
possible to work this crop in as a catch crop, 
and occasionally to sow it on a portion of the 
wheat and oats stubble if chinch bugs are not 
sufficiently numerous to interfere. For the best 
quality of hay, sorghum should be cut just as 
it is heading out. When cut at this stage, the 
food materials which later are concentrated in 
the seed are uniformly distributed throughout 
the plant and the stems have not become woody. 
The general custom is to cure sorghum hay in 
large piles, after having permitted the crop to 
wilt and partially dry in the swath and wind- 
row. Often these piles remain in the field until 
fed, but there is naturally much waste as a re- 
sult of this method. A better plan is to stack 
the hay in large stacks after it has well cured 
and to be particular about topping out the 
stacks so that they will not take water. A few 
farmers in the Central Southwest have adopted 
the custom of always having a few stacks of 
sorghum hay left over in the spring so as to 
make absolutely sure of an abundance of rough 
feed for all of the farm livestock whenever an 
exceedingly dry season comes along. 

191. For seed sorghum is planted and culti- 



THE FORAGE 121 

vated in tlie same manner as kafireorn and milo- 
maize. (12.) The varieties most commonly 
grown are Black Amber, Orange, and Sumac. 
It is well to make a contract with some dealer 
in seeds before planting a large acreage to 
sorghnm for seed purposes. The market for 
sorghum seed is confined to the demand for 
planting purposes and in seasons of heavy pro- 
duction the price is very low. 

192. Pasturing sorghum with cattle is at- 
tended with some danger. When the crop is 
stunted in growth either by drouth or frost, 
Prussic acid, which is the poisonous principle 
of potassium cyanide, develops and cattle eat- 
ing of such sorghum die very quickly. Losses 
from this cause do not appear to be so frequent 
in Oklahoma and Texas as in Kansas and Ne- 
braska, and many cattlemen regularly utilize? 
sorghum for pasture, especially for animals 
necessarily confined to small lots. Hungry 
cattle turned into a field of succulent sorghum 
are also very susceptible to bloat and precau- 
tions are necessary until the cattle become ac- 
customed to the sorghum pasture. 

193. The widest use of sorghum as a pasture 
crop is for hogs, though it produces but small 
gains, and is valuable chiefly for its succulence. 
It produces an abundance of forage during dry, 
hot weather, when other crops make but little 
growth. Usually it is ready to pasture within 
six weeks after sowing and the hogs should not 



122 SUEE FEED CROPS 

be turned in until the growth is at least one and 
one-half feet high. About one acre of pasture 
should be provided for each twelve to fifteen 
head of 100-pound hogs and a supplementary 
ration of grain is necessary if the hogs are to 
be expected to make much growth. Losses of 
hogs pasturing on sorghum, due to sorghum 
poisoning, are very rare. 

194. The feeding value of sorghum hay is 
very similar to that of corn fodder and kafir- 
corn and milomaize fodders from which the 
heads have been removed. It may profitably be 
substituted for prairie hay in the feeding of 
horses and may form a very large share of the 
ration of stock cattle receiving a light feed of 
cottonseed meal or cottonseed cake. Steers may 
be wintered very economically and satisfac- 
torily on nothing but sorghum hay and two 
pounds of cottonseed cake per day per head. 
Sorghum hay cannot replace alfalfa, cowpea, or 
peanut hay in either cattle or steer feeding, but 
it may be used as a supplementary feed from 
which the cattle may eat their fill after having 
had a properly balanced ration of ground kafir- 
eorn or milomaize and cottonseed meal or 
ground kafircorn or milomaize and limited 
amounts of alfalfa, cowpea, or peanut hay. In 
seasons of extremely high prices of grain, stock 
may be wintered fairly well with no other feed 
than sorghum hay, and an abundance of it on 
hand at all times will bring greater profits to 



THE FORAGE 123 

stockmen than can be had from depending upon 
the pasture furnished by stalk fields. 

195. Very sandy soils may be quickly im- 
proved in texture by growing on them and plow- 
ing under a crop of sorghum just as it is head- 
ing out. No other crop will so quickly furnish 
a large amount of vegetable matter which, when 
decayed, becomes incorporated with the par- 
ticles of sand and causes them to stick together 
more closely, thus improving the ability of the 
soil to hold moisture. The growing of sorghum 
on the land and plowing it under adds nothing 
to the supply of plant food in the soil, but if 
turned under in July and the land is not planted 
to a crop until spring, beneficial results almost 
invariably follow if the soil is very sandy. 

196. Sorghum smut sometimes interferes with 
the production of satisfactory sorghum seed. 
This may be prevented by the same treatment 
recommended for the seed of kafircorn. (32.) 

MILLET 

197. German millet is the variety commonly 
grown. Two pecks of seed per acre are broad- 
casted or drilled on land previously plowed and 
harrowed. To insure a crop in seasons of short 
rainfall, millet should be sown in May or early 
June; in seasons with ample July rainfall, it 
may be sown as late as the middle of that 
month. Millet is largely used as a catch crop, 



124 SURE FEED CROPS 

in much the same manner as cowpeas, and for 
that reason, the acreage is variable. 

198. Texas millet, or Colorado grass, is a com- 
mon weed in portions of Texas and has been 
reported from a few localities in Oklahoma. 
Though possessing the habits of a weed, it is 
useful as a hay crop. Like all millets, this is 
an annual, but the seed shatters and remains in 
the soil until the following season. It makes 
but little growth early in the season and does 
not interfere with the growth of cultivated 
crops. After corn, for example, has matured, 
this variety of millet makes a good growth 
which may be cut for hay. 

199. Millet hay should be cut while in bloom 
and before the seed have begun maturing. If 
mature seed is in the hay, not only do the stems 
become woody so that they are not eaten well 
by stock but the seed has an injurious effect on 
the kidneys of the animals which eat it. If cut 
while in bloom, millet hay may be fed to horses 
and cattle and has about the same feeding value 
as good prairie hay. With diminishing acre- 
ages of native meadows, it is probable that 
millet will be more extensively grown. But the 
production of large amounts of kafircorn fodder 
and sorghum hay may make the growing of 
millet entirely unnecessary unless the individ- 
ual has a special preference for it. . 



THE FORAGE 125 



SILAGE 



200. Succulent feed at all times, if it can be 
provided, is of great value in maintaining a 
regular flow of milk from dairy cattle and in 
keeping stock cattle in thrifty, growing condi- 
tion. Decreasing acreages of native pasture, 
short wheat pasture through several winters, 
and drouthy seasons have combined to interest 
the farmers of the Central Southwest in silos 
as a means of storing succulent feed for their 
cattle. They are seeking some regular plan of 
storing feed which will not fail in seasons of ex- 
treme drouth, and which will be profitable in 
normal seasons. Prior to 1909, relatively few 
farmers in Kansas, Oklahoma, and Texas had 
built silos, though their use has been quite gen- 
eral in the Central States for many years. Since 
then, large numbers of silos have been erected 
in Kansas, Oklahoma, and the Texas Pan- 
handle. 

201. It will pay the farmer who has, or can 
get, twenty or more cattle to feed throughout 
the year, to build a silo and regularly grow a 
crop with which to fill it. But it is exceedingly 
doubtful if it will pay anyone to erect a silo for 
the purpose of storing sun-scorched corn fodder 
in the occasional years when drouth prevents 
the formation of ears. The man who buys a silo 
intending to use it every month in the year as a 
means of storing succulent feed for cattle is on 



126 SUEE FEED CROPS 

the right track; if he has the cattle or can get 
them. The silo should be an integral part of the 
livestock equipment to be used every year; not 
a temporary expedient for use only in dry years. 

202. The silo is a big can, air-tight except at 
the top, in which green fodder of any sort, with 
solid stems, may be preserved in much the same 
manner as fruits and vegetables are canned and 
preserved for human food. The process is dif- 
ferent but the result is essentially the same. 
The fodder, cut into short lengths, not over an 
inch long, and firmly tramped in the silo, settles 
and undergoes a fermentation which develops 
heat and drives out the air and sterilizes the 
product so that no further fermentation can 
take place until more air is admitted. The cut 
fodder at the top of the silo decays more com- 
pletely and forms a covering which prevents 
the air from penetrating to a depth of more 
than one to two feet. Silage is canned, green 
fodder. 

203. Many types of silos are in use. The 
Kansas Experiment Station at Manhattan and 
the Oklahoma Experiment Station at Stillwater 
have published bulletins describing different 
types. Manufacturers of Portland cement have 
prepared plans and specifications for building 
concrete silos which may be obtained from al- 
most any dealer in Portland cement. Vitrified 
hollow tile, properly curved for cylindrical silo 
construction, are coming into extensive use in 



h 



THE FORAGE 127 

Iowa. Cylindrical stave silos are manufactured 
by several firms who advertise in the farm 
papers. Numerous manufacturers are selling 
silos built of sections of galvanized iron with 
interlocking joints, painted inside with a coat- 
ing of gas tar to prevent corrosion by the acids 
of the silage. Some silos are built partially 
above and partially below the ground and a 
few are repeating the original plan of building 
silos like cisterns, which has long ago been dis- 
carded where silos are in general use. The re- 
quirements of use should be kept in mind when 
deciding upon a type of silo to build. It must 
be air-tight except at the top ; must not dry out 
during very dry spells and permit evaporation 
of moisture through the walls; must not blow 
down easily or require close attention to keep 
in safe condition, either when full or empty; 
and must be so placed and constructed that the 
silage may be fed out with the minimum amount 
of labor. It should also be durable and require 
the minimum of annual repairs and attention. 

204. The size of the silo should be such that 
not less than two inches of silage is fed from 
the surface each day and it is better if four to 
six inches are fed daily. The higher the silo, 
within reasonable limits, the better the silage 
settles and keeps. A silo fifteen feet in diameter 
by twenty-nine feet high will hold one hundred 
and ten tons. It will take about seven to ten 
acres of average corn or kafircom to fill this 



128 SURE FEED CROPS 

and it will provide forty pounds per day per 
head for twenty-six cattle for six months. If 
double this amount of feed is wanted, two silos 
will be better than a single silo of double this 
capacity. 

205. Crops for silage should be regularly 
planted for that purpose. Corn is the earliest 
crop which may be grown for filling the silo. 
It should be planted as early as is safe for the 
locality, in the same manner as if the corn was 
being grown for the grain alone. An early va- 
riety is best, so that it may be matured, if pos- 
sible, before the dry summer weather which so 
frequently reduces the yields. If drouth pre- 
vents the formation of ears, the fodder should 
be cut and put in the silo before the leaves have 
died. If conditions are favorable, the corn 
should be allowed to nearly mature, having 
passed the roasting ear stage before being put 
in the silo. In all of the Central Southwest, 
there should be planted each year a sufficient 
acreage of kafircorn to fill the silos. It should 
be planted at the earliest date which experience 
in the locality has shown to give the highest 
average yields of grain. There will then be no 
question about something with which to fill the 
silo being produced. Sorghum and milomaize 
may also be put in the silo but they are not as 
satisfactory as kafircorn and corn. 

206. Pilling the silo requires considerable 
labor, but for only a short time. The kafircorn 



THE FORAGE 129 

or corn may be cut with a corn binder or sled 
cutters. It should be placed on low wagons and 
at once hauled to the silo where a power cutter 
is arranged to cut the fodder into pieces not 
more than an inch long and blow it into the silo. 
From three to five farmers might well join in 
ownership of the power and cutter and help 
each other in the work of filling. Men with 
threshing outfits might also make silo-filling 
part of their business. The cut fodder should 
be evenly distributed and well tramped, the 
middle being kept full and the tramping being 
heaviest around the walls. If the silo is of wood 
or concrete, the walls should be thoroughly wet 
down with water before filling begins. If the 
silo is of galvanized iron, it should be thor- 
oughly cleaned inside and painted with gas tar 
a few weeks before filling. Unless the fodder 
has dried up beyond the proper stage for put- 
ting in the silo, it is not necessary to add water 
as the silo is being filled. But if the fodder is 
dry, wetting down with water will help put it 
in condition to settle and keep well. Do not 
put salt on the silage. 

207. Sealing the silo after it is filled is accom- 
plished by thoroughly wetting down the top 
two feet of cut fodder, then covering it with a 
foot or two of chaff or short straw and wetting 
this thoroughly, then letting it alone and not 
walking around over it to *'see if it^s keeping 
all right.'' Fermentation will soon begin and 
this will drive some of the moisture up through 



130 SUEE FEED CKOPS 

the wet layer on top. This will partially decay 
and effectually seal the top. A roof on a silo 
adds to its appearance but is not necessary. 

208. Corn silage put up in July may be used 
to supplement the pastures. Feeding may begin 
as soon as filling is completed. The succulence 
of silage adds greatly to its feeding value but 
its real value as feed depends upon the amount 
of grain which it contains. Cattle of all sorts 
fed silage may be expected to do about as well 
as if they had an abundance of grass pasture. 
After part or all of the corn silage has been fed 
out, the kafircorn which should always be 
planted for this purpose may be put into the 
silo at any time before frost. The fact that the 
stalks and leaves of kafircorn remain green for 
a long time after the grain has matured makes 
the period during which the crop may be put 
into the silo longer than with corn. The cut 
kafircorn should be put in right on top of the 
corn silage and, if not to be fed at once, sealed 
after filling is completed. The spoiled silage 
at the top should be removed when feeding 
begins and the silage should be taken from the 
entire area of the top at least once every two 
days. 

209. Silage is rough feed and should not be 
expected to take the place of grain in the ration. 
While it is possible for cattle to make fair gains 
when fed silage made from kafircorn or corn 
containing a full crop of grain, the amount of 



THE FORAGE 131 

grain supplied by the silage is not enough for 
the best returns. Steers were fattened in Okla- 
homa during the winter of 1911-1912 on nothing 
but silage and cottonseed cake and the high 
prices of kafircorn and corn made this the most 
practicable ration. A ration of silage and one 
to two pounds of cottonseed meal or cake per 
day per head will carry stock cattle through 
the winter in excellent condition and maintain 
them in fine shape to begin feeding. Alfalfa, 
cowpea, or peanut hay may take the place of 
cottonseed meal for such purposes, but some 
feed rich in protein should always be supplied 
when silage is being fed. Silage supplements 
alfalfa hay and each adds to the value of the 
other in general feeding. 

210. For fattening steers, silage is coming 
into increasingly extensive use. The stockman 
who makes steer feeding a part of his farm 
operations, and many more of them should do 
so, will find a silo a valuable investment. The 
grain ration should consist of four to five parts 
of ground kafircorn, milomaize, or corn mixed 
with one part of cottonseed meal, fed in such 
gradually increasing amounts as the cattle eat 
up clean without going ^ ^ off feed ' \ From twenty- 
five to thirty-five pounds of silage should be fed 
per day per head and the ration will be im- 
proved if a few pounds of alfalfa, cowpea, or 
peanut hay are fed. Variety in the ration, if 
properly balanced, quickly shows its benefits in 
increased rapidity of gains and better finish of 



132 SURE FEED CROPS 

the cattle. It is a mistake to expect that silage 
alone will supply a satisfactory feed for fatten- 
ing steers. But many experiments have shown 
that when properly fed as rough feed, supple- 
menting a balanced ration of grain, silage is of 
much greater value than the fodder from a like 
acreage of kafircorn or corn prepared for feed- 
ing in any other manner. 

211. Silage has long been used as feed for 
dairy cattle and it is only in recent years that 
it has been extensively used in steer feeding. 
The succulence of silage is a great factor in 
maintaining the flow of milk. But as in steer 
feeding, heavy production should not be ex- 
pected from feeding nothing but silage to dairy 
cows. They should be fed ground kafircorn, 
milomaize, or corn mixed with about one-fourth 
as much cottonseed meal, or one of these grains 
and alfalfa, cowpea, or peanut hay in addition 
to a liberal ration of silage. The amount of 
silage fed will depend upon the ability of indi- 
vidual cows to consume it profitably and will 
vary from thirty to fifty pounds per day per 
head. The amount of grain fed should vary 
with the milk production of the different cows, 
this being a measure of their ability to turn 
feed into milk at a profit. A dairyman with ten 
or more cows can scarcely afford to be without a 
silo in regions of short rainfall where pastures 
quickly dry up and periods of excessively high 
prices for feed are not infrequent. 



THE FORAGE 133 

212. Cash value of silage. One great point in 
favor of silage is that it is not marketable. It 
can be sold only for feeding at the silo, thus 
keeping elements of fertility which it contains 
on the farm which produced it. Perhaps $2.50 
per ton may be taken as a fair average cash 
value of silage. Fed to good steers or to dairy 
cattle, it will turn out more than this, just as 
under average conditions, kafircorn, milomaize, 
or corn when fed bring returns above their 
market value. The silo does not offer an easy 
way to prosperity to men inexperienced in the 
feeding of livestock. But it does furnish a 
means whereby the careful stockman may 
establish his business on a firmer foundation 
than when he depends upon dry feed alone. 

213. Hogs will eat silage and steers being fat- 
tened should always be followed by hogs. Sil- 
age should not be expected to do more than 
replace pasture in hog feeding. 

214. Idle horses may be fed some silage to ad- 
vantage but silage in any considerable amounts 
is not good feed for working horses. Horses fed 
silage should also receive hay. Silage can fill 
many places profitably in the farms of the Cen- 
tral Southwest but its extensive use in horse 
feeding is not one of them. 



THE PASTURE 



215. Grass is first in importance to stockmen. 
Producing heavy yields on fertile lands, cover- 
ing rough, untillable lands and causing them 
to be productive, grass requires no labor in the 
harvest and the returns in the way of added 
weight of the livestock pastured upon it are 
practically net. The constant desire of the 
stockman is for nutritious grasses on which his 
flocks and herds may graze, taking on cheap 
growth and gains in weight without impover- 
ishing the soil, but often adding to its produc- 
tivity. 

216. Grasses adapt themselves in but small 
degree to new and unfavorable environment. 
Each variety and kind finds its best develop- 
ment under conditions of soil and climate fitted 
to its habit of growth and responds but feebly 
to attempts to establish it where the conditions 
requisite to its natural growth do not exist. A 
compelling sentiment seems to drive settlers on 
new lands to attempts to establish there the 
grasses of the pasture and meadow on the old 
home farm. The lawn about the new home 
must be sodded with the grass which carpeted 
the soil under the trees about the old home- 
steady or it will not seem like home, 

134 



*rHE PASTURPJ 135 

a 

217. Native grasses of the prairie, with but 
few exceptions, soon disappear under the close 
occupancy of farm stock. Sloping soils under 
clean cultivation soon develop into gullies and 
the sand and silt are carried down and spread 
over the fertile bottom lands below. Weeds 
take the place of nutritious grasses in the pas- 
tures and the feeding of livestock through the 
summers becomes an increasingly difficult prob- 
lem. Many of the grass problems of the states 
of Kansas, Oklahoma, and Texas are still un- 
solved. 

BERMUDA GRASS 

218. In 1892, immediately after the Oklahoma 
Agricultural Experiment Station was estab- 
lished, one of the first things done was the sow- 
ing of the seed of more than two hundred va- 
rieties of grasses gathered from all parts of the 
world. While at that time, there was an abund- 
ance of native grasses, it was recognized that in 
all probability the grass question would still 
be unanswered when it came to be of pressing 
importance. Seed of the most promising grasses 
selected from these, and others as they were 
obtained, were sown every year thereafter, and 
such kinds as are best propagated from root- 
stocks were transplanted and carefully tended. 

219. Fourteen years' results from this work 
were summed up by the writer, in Bulletin 70 



136 SUEE FEED CROPS 

of the Oklahoma station, issued in June, 1906, 
as follows: 

*^When once established, hardy bermuda 
grass is not easily killed out. There need be no 
fear of its 'taking the country' and becoming a 
pest this far north. The only complaint here is 
that, after having been growing on the station 
farm for fourteen years, it has 'taken' so little 
of it. But bermuda grass does not work well in 
a rotation. Its place is for permanent pasture, 
for hay on good land subject to overflow, and 
for a solid covering for the lawn and the usual 
muddy spots about the house and feed lots. The 
station has it growing and giving a profitable 
yield of pasture on land so full of white alkali 
that no other crop will grow. In spots, it has 
been under water for three weeks and kept on 
growing, thus showing its adaptability to over- 
flow lands. Eighteen inches of tough clay have 
been tamped down on an established sod of ber- 
muda grass and in six weeks, the grass made its 
way through and formed a sod on top. Strips 
of bermuda sod have been placed four feet apart 
across gullies by the roadside, and within two 
years, it was necessary to plow out the gutter 
to furnish a place for the water to run. Ditches 
in cultivated fields, so deep as to be Impassable 
for farm machinery, have been filled in one 
season by the dirt caught by bermuda grass 
planted in the hard soil in the bottom of the 
ditch. New pond banks have been sodded over 



TIIE PASTURE 137 

in one season with a tough mat of bermuda 
which absolutely prevents washing. 

' ' After ten years of futile attempts to make the 
college campus presentable by sowing seed of 
Kentucky blue grass, orchard grass, meadow 
fescue, all the clovers, and a great variety of 
mixtures of seed of other grasses, bermuda 
grass has in three seasons covered it with a 
heavy sod which is green from April to October 
when grass ought to be green. And during the 
winter, there is a clean covering over the whole 
surface, without mud when it rains or dust when 
it blows. 

^^Som.etime, a more satisfactory grass than 
hardy bermuda grass may be developed in Ok- 
lahoma. But after having repeatedly sown 
every grass that could be found, through four- 
teen seasons in Oklahoma, the station has only 
this variety of bermuda grass to show for the 
work. It is satisfactory in every respect in this 
locality and trials which have been made of it 
elsewhere in the Territory indicate its future 
usefulness over the entire area. In the north- 
western fourth of Oklahoma, and along the 
northern boundary, it may not be entirely satis- 
factory, but there is every reason to expect it 
to provide profitable pasturage under suitable 
treatment even there." 

220. Bermuda grass is probably a native of 
India. It was introduced into Georgia in 1812 
and from there soon spread to the other south- 
em states. It is the one pasture grass of out- 



138 SUEE FEED CROPS 

standing value for the south, just as Kentucky 
blue grass is the standard pasture in regions 
naturally adapted to its growth. But the pro- 
duction of cotton and not of livestock was for 
so long the chief industry of the southern states, 
and since the habit of growth of bermuda grass 
caused it to persist in the cotton fields, it was 
long regarded as a pest instead of a benefactor. 
In Oklahoma, the northerner has wanted grass 
and many have spent years in vain endeavor to 
establish Kentucky blue grass, refusing to ac- 
cept bermuda, the one grass which will persist 
and furnish pasture. Tlie southerner, recollect- 
ing the days spent in hoeing out bermuda grass 
in the cotton fields, will have none of it and re- 
fuses to accept the gift which Nature has 
offered. These transplanted sentiments and 
prejudices are slowly being overcome and ber- 
muda grass is coming to be recognized as the 
only pasture grass for the greater portion of 
Oklahoma. 

221. Hardy bermuda grass is merely bermuda 
grass which has grown in a given locality until 
it has become acclimated through natural selec- 
tion and possesses increased ability over the 
original stock to withstand extremely low tem- 
peratures. Bermuda grass grown from seed is 
almost always severely damaged by very cold 
weather and often only a few plants survive. 
These in time spread and cover the ground. A 
still colder winter will kill many of the plants, 
but these, in turn, will occupy the land. The 



THE PASTURE 139 

bermuda grass which survives these unfavor- 
able conditions starts into growth earlier in the 
spring than the original stock, is not killed by 
hard freezes, and is called hardy because of 
these qualities. 

222. Bermuda grass has limits on the north 
and west beyond which it is not profitable as a 
pasture grass. Bulletin 175 of the Kansas Ex- 
periment Station, says: ^^At this station, it 
usually winter-kills, but in the southern counties 
of the state it is comparatively hardy, and 
farmers there have reported that they have 
grown it successfully for periods of from four 
to eight years." Bermuda grass has not proven 
entirely satisfactory in the northern half of 
Oklahoma west of the ninety-eighth meridian. 
Its limits of profitable growth in western Texas 
have not been defined, though probably they 
will closely correspond with the limits of profit- 
able cotton culture. 

223. Starting bermuda grass from seed is not 

satisfactory. It should always be propagated 
from sod of the grass which has become accli- 
mated to conditions. Many years of natural 
selection may thus be made to contribute to the 
obtaining of a profitable pasture at once. The 
quickeist stand will be obtained from planting 
bermuda roots at favorable times from April to 
July in well prepared land. If bermuda roots 
are planted as potatoes are planted, in rows 
wide enough apart for a cultivation or two, the 



140 SUEE.FEED CROPS 

pieces of sod being entirely covered, success is 
almost certain except in seasons of extreme 
drouth. Methods of planting vary from this 
very widely. Bermuda may be started by drop- 
ping roots in furrows as the land is being 
plowed shallow; by dropping roots in lister fur- 
rows just before the ditches are filled when cul- 
tivating crops ; by loading the sod in a manure 
spreader and scattering the roots over roughly 
plowed land, disking them in; by dropping roots 
on the surface of the soil during wet spells and 
forcing them into the soil with a forked stick; 
or by any other plan which will bring either 
the runners or underground stems of bermuda 
grass in contact with moist soil which is warm 
enough to stimulate growth. Tearing the sods 
to pieces and stringing the underground stems 
and runners in a furrow where they may be 
completely covered is more likely to produce a 
satisfactory sod quickly than carefully setting 
out small pieces of sod or small bunches of 
roots with the tops exposed. In selecting sod 
for planting, that which shows evidence of most 
vigor and which starts into growth earliest in 
the spring should be chosen. 

224. Results of experience with bermuda 
grass in Oklahoma have been reported in great 
numbers, the writer having collected them dur- 
ing a period of fifteen years. They represent 
wide variations due to the time and manner of 
planting, and the character of the soil and cli- 
mate and treatment. It is thought that a few 



THE PASTURE 141 

of them, collected in the spring of 1911, will 
give a clearer idea of what to expect than can 
be obtained from an extended discussion. 

225. Texas County, Western Oklahoma. '*In 
May, 1908, we planted five sacks of bermuda 
roots as yon would plant potatoes. The season 
was dry but the grass nearly covered the 
ground. It winter-killed badly, but we plowed 
it up and scattered the live roots and the grass 
! covered the land in mid-winter in 1909. It was 

a very dry year and the runners died, leaving 
ionly the main bunch. It winter-killed back to 
about half a stand but I thought it would suc- 
ceed and broke more land by the side of the 
strip where we had bermuda planted. We scat- 
tered the sods in the spring of 1910 and it cov- 
ered the ground by mid-summer. Now, we do 
not have a spear of bermuda left, and I am con- 
vinced that at this altitude and with our ex- 
tremely dry climate, bermuda is a failure.'' 

226. Beaver County, Western Oklahoma. ''In 
the spring of 1905, I received a package of ber- 
muda roots sent to me by mail from Hill county, 
Texas. In the spring of 1908 I planted one- 
quarter acre with roots ; in the spring of 1909 I 
planted three-quarters of an acre, making one 
acre in all. In the spring of 1910 I thought it 
was all killed and I plowed a part of the land 
and planted it in watermelons. The grass 
began to come out and I did not make many 
melons on it. This spring it was all killed out 



142 SUEE FEED CROPS 

again and I broke a part of the sod and double 
disked it and drilled the land in cane. I in- 
tended to plant out several acres of the roots in 
1910, but it was killed out so I could not get the 
roots to plant. I thought after it came out so 
in 1910 that I would plant quite a lot this spring 
but it killed out worse than it was last year; 
so I have decided that bermuda grass is a 
failure and will not do to depend on in Beaver 
county for pasture. I have not got any better 
prospect for pasture and not as regular stand 
as I had two or three years ago. It kills out so 
in winter that the weeds take it unless I plow 
it in spring and then it takes all summer to get 
ready to pasture. I see some say that the 
drouth killed their grass. My bermuda has 
stood the dry weather as well as my alfalfa, but 
it is the freezes that killed mine. It takes it 
too long in spring to get started to depend on 
it for pasture here. ' ' 

227. Alfalfa County, Western Oklahoma. 

** Several years ago I received some roots from 
the Experiment Station and they have done 
very well. Last winter was very hard on it and, 
in fact, I thought it dead, but by the 15th of 
April it had started out nicely and at present is 
looking fine.'' 

228. Alfalfa County, Western Oklahoma. 

** Planted an acre of bermuda in April, 1910, 
securing the roots from a neighbor. Only about 
a half stand came up on account of drouth. Part 



THE PASTUEE 143 

of the land was alkali and part sandy. It 
sodded over the alkali ground within ninety 
days after planting, but did not spread much 
on the sandy land. A dozen hogs ran on it 
after it got started and plenty of growth was 
left for winter protection on the alkali land. 
It is now apparently dead on the sandy land 
but about half of it is started on alkali spots." 

229. Grant County, Western Oklahoma. ''1 

secured a few roots from the Experiment Sta- 
tion at Stillwater on June 11, 1906, and have 
worked earnestly to get my washy hillsides to 
bermuda ever since, but have failed. I have ten 
acres of hillside with clay subsoil that I have 
put in bermuda three successive years and had 
it to die on account of drouth and cold winters 
each time. Had intended to try it again this 
spring but find my first patch that has been 
planted five years so badly killed out that I 
have given it up. I have been enthusiastic about 
bermuda all along and have caused much of it 
to be planted around here, furnishing the roots 
free, but last winter has pretty nearly settled 
it in this neighborhood. I have not pastured it 
any, as it did not get far enough along except 
the first planting which I kept for getting roots 
from. ' ' 

230. Custer County, Western Oklahoma. ^*I 

planted about nine sacks of roots last year; put 
them out in May on about two acres of land. 
We had good rains shortly after and the grass 



144 SURE FEED CROPS 

came up and grew fine right throngli the dry 
weather in the snmmer. We had one good rain 
in August, which started it growing again and 
by October the ground was almost covered. I 
felt good to think that I had a start of bermuda 
at last, but some of my friends told me that it 
would die out when winter came. One of them 
told me that he had been trying it for several 
years and it always winter-killed. Another has 
had the same experience. Bermuda is all right 
where it will grow, but it will never do in the 
northwestern part of the state. ' ' 

231. Custer County, Western Oklahoma. **I 

have known bermuda grass for fifteen years. 
In the southern states it has taken many a val- 
uable piece of land and entirely ruined it for 
farming purposes, but produced a wonderful lot 
of hay and pasture. There is plenty of better 
feed than bermuda hay but for pasture there is 
nothing in the southern states that excels it. It 
comes early in spring and stays until frost and 
it doesn 't matter much whether it rains or not, 
it stays green. In this part of Oklahoma no 
man need be afraid of bermuda taking his land. 
The worst trouble we have here is to keep it. 
It gets so cold here it freezes out. I planted my 
lawn and barnyard last of May, 1910, and as 
dry as it was, nobody had a finer lot of grass 
than I had, unless it was bermuda. But the 
cold and dry winter killed much of it. If all the 
washed off hillsides were in bermuda, we cer- 
tainly would have pasture that would be worth 



THE PASTUEE 145 

two to one of what we have got. So plant ber- 
mnda for pasture and turn out your stock on it, 
and save time and labor of sticking up signs, 
'keep off the grass'." 

232. Washita County, Western Oklahoma. 

** After a careful examination, I find that about 
half of my bermuda grass is dead. It was 
planted five years ago; part of the roots ob- 
tained from the Experiment Station and part 
from seed from the United States Department 
of Agriculture. There is no difference in them. 
Both died out alike. None of it has been pas- 
tured during the past twelve months." 

233. Kiowa County, Western Oklahoma. ^^I 

started with a few roots sent me from the Ex- 
periment Station five years ago and planted 
them in my yard on freshly broken sod, getting 
a fair stand and covering the ground in two 
years. The second year being a very wet one, 
it did reasonably well but, except that season, 
it was almost a failure, freezing back very badly 
each year. It is almost all frozen out now ex- 
cept some few sprigs just showing up. I am 
taking care of it; fertilized the ground and re- 
plowed it. All of the grass which has been 
planted since is in better shape than that in the 
yard. I have no bermuda grass that I consider 
good, but I have neither tended it well nor given 
it a fair piece of ground. Hogs certainly like 
bermuda grass roots, as they are fresh and 
sappy when the alfalfa is dead." 



146 SURE FEED CROPS 

234. Blaine County, Central Oklahoma. ''Very 
little of our bermuda died either from dry 
weather or freezing. Probably not over five 
percent, of it is damaged. This is the big va- 
riety of bermnda which yon sent us from the 
Experiment Station several years ago. The 
small variety which we got at Kingfisher, and 
which has stood for eight or nine years here, is 
damaged from sixty to seventy-five percent, but 
it is starting nicely and bids fair to reset the 
tract.'' 

235. Garfield County, Central Oklahoma. *'I 

have patiently waited for warm weather but am 
compelled now to state that my bermuda is 
nearly all dead on the half acre which I planted 
three years ago and cared for well, never pas- 
turing it closely or late. It is now about one- 
third of a stand which will thicken up to a sod 
again. That which T planted last year and the 
year before is all dead." 

236. Canadian County, Central Oklahoma. 

''My bermuda grass is alive but have been hold- 
ing my opinion as long as possible for fear of 
accident. There are more dead roots in it than 
common, but there are always some. Where 
not pastured into the ground,* it is fine grazing 
now. It is at least twenty days late this year. 
On the poorest high places where pastured hard, 
it is coming but from the deep roots." 

237. Canadian County, Central Oklahoma. 

**My bermuda planted last June on well pre- 



THE PASTURE 147 

pared ground and kept clean made a nice 
growth and completely covered the ground. Six 
or seven roots only have started growth this 
spring. Neighbors ' pieces likewise are all dead, 
but it came from the same stock. Alfalfa seeded 
last spring makes a pretty fair show and the 
old patch is doing well. It looks as though it 
can stand more than bermuda.'' 

238. Oklahoma County, Central Oklahoma. 

*^ Genuine, hardy bermuda grass is in good con- 
dition on my farm and it was pastured to the 
roots last year. It was set out in July, 1908, on 
sandy soil. Other kinds of bermuda are dead 
or badly hurt. A few warm days may change 
their condition. I firmly believe that the genu- 
ine, hardy bermuda grass will hold its own 
under the most trying of circumstances.'' 

239. Pottawatomie County, Central Oklahoma. 

**In 1910 I set bermuda in the hog lot and some 
just outside where the cattle and horses ate on 
it, tramped on it, and wallowed in it. I thought 
this would surely die, but instead it is green and 
nice at this time. That in the hog lot made 
good growth, but it is nearly all dead now,— 
just a few green sprigs are showing. Some little 
patches in the pasture, which had been sodded 
over for four or ^ve years, are dead but this 
does not discourage me. I have set out some 
more this spring and intend to plant still more 
if nothing prevents it. ' ' 



148 SURE FEED CROPS 

240. Lincoln County, Central Oklahoma. '*I 

was compelled to pasture my bermuda very 
heavily during the drouth last summer and was 
afraid that it was dead. It is coming out since 
the spring rains, and if we ever get any warm 
weather it will be all right. If the day ever 
comes when every acre of land in Lincoln 
county that will grow alfalfa is seeded to al- 
falfa and all the rest of the land is set to ber- 
muda, we will have made a move in the right 
direction. ' ' 

241. Lincoln County, Central Oklahoma. In 
the spring of 1911, F. A. Mitchell wrote: ''We 
thought ninety-five percent, of our Lincoln 
county bermuda grass dead but find that per- 
cent, now living. Every warm day develops 
new shoots. We have examined very many 
fields and have found none entirely dead, only 
in patches. The unprecedented drouth of last 
year and the hard sharp freezes of last winter 
struck a staggering blow to bermuda long set 
or new set upon sandy or any other soil. 

^'Some tracts we are now pasturing; others 
will not be ready until July, while other small 
tracts we will plow up and reset. We estimate 
that more bermuda will be set in Lincoln county 
this year than during the past five years. Farm- 
ers have been drawing roots by the wagon 
load from tracts not damaged. We have al- 
ready set over forty acres this spring and shall 
continue in well doing. 



THE PASTURE 149 

'^nVliat if ninety-five percent, of the bermuda 
•was dead! We would set the five percent, and 
try it again. Oats blight and we sow again. 
Kafir blasts and we plant again. At least one- 
third of our cotton crop was destroyed last year 
by the cotton worm and sharp shooters, yet we 
add twenty-five percent, to the acreage of our 
cotton this year. Mules die and we raise or 
buy more. Wives die and men get married 
again. 

*'We say bermuda grass for Lincoln county, 
now and forever, one and inseparable. Let it 
grow until it shall transform our depleted hill- 
sides into pastures of carpeted green, and our 
farmers from a mortgage bondage into the full 
liberty of independent plentitude." 

242. Caddo County, Central Oklahoma. ''Ber- 
muda is very fine pasture while it is here. Can 't 
be beat. It comes in late and goes out at the 
first frost. It is hard to get started and at first 
is expensive. As to bermuda hay, I would as 
soon have good oat straw. I have five acres, 
put out last spring, but it was so dry it did not 
get set good and I am afraid it has not lived 
through the winter. My neighbor south of me 
has thirty acres and I know of four others. But 
they are out on the prairie, not protected by 
timber, and froze out a year ago. Three of them 
reset last spring and it was dry and it didn't do 
so well. However, it may not be dead. We hope 
not. I fully believe that if we can ever get 
bermuda four years old, being careful not to 



150 SURE FEED CROPS 

pasture too closely and never burn it off, there 
will never be danger of it freezing out." 

243. Cleveland County, Central Oklahoma. 

**I have examined my bermuda grass fields, 
which were planted one, two, and three years 
ago; some pastured and some not pastured. I 
have found all of the summer and fall growth 
dead but the original roots are usually alive 
and springing, although it will take the entire 
summer to get it back where it was. I am very 
sorry about this, as it has shaken my faith a 
little in the hardiness of this splendid pasture 
grass. However, the failure was no doubt 
caused by the drouth." 

244. Cleveland County, Central Oklahoma. ''I 

have a piece of bottom land which overflows and 
I did not know what to do with it. I planted 
bermuda grass year before last. It is simply 
fine and hard freezes do not hurt it. But in the 
orchard, where some of it started some years 
ago, it is all dead because it was plowed in the 
fall and the ground was loose. We need not be 
afraid that it will ^ take the country, ' but it will 
keep our stock fat if we let them have plenty 
of it." 

245. Logan County, Central Oklahoma. 

**Here is the way I plant bermuda grass roots: 
I use the front wheels of a narrow-tired wagon 
and the hind wheels of a wide-tired wagon. I 
put on a set of dump boards and load the wagon 



THE PASTURE 151 

with sods cut about two inches square. I drive 
the wagon down the furrows previously made 
by using the two hind shovels of a cultivator 
set the right distance apart to fit the wagon 
tracks. A boy or man seated on each side of 
the wagon drops the sods into the tracks made 
by the front wheels, and the hind wheels press 
them down into the soft earth." 

246. Oklahoma County, Central Oklahoma. 

''There seems to be one good feature about the 
dry winter; it has killed about all the slow- 
starting bermuda. Now we should set none 
but the rank, quick-starting, hardy kind. I had 
five varieties of bermuda last year. I now 
have just two kinds; both vigorous, early-start- 
ing, regardless of soil, location, condition, or 
protection." 

247. Latimer County, Eastern Oklahoma. ''In 

the spring of 1910 I secured from a farmer near 
McLoud, Oklahoma, ten sacks of bermuda turf. 
Had prepared a plot of ground, about two and 
one-half acres next to a public highway, and in 
April small pieces of turf were dropped in fur- 
rows thirty inches apart and covered with a 
garden hoe. The weeds and bushes (it is new 
ground, with a few scattering trees left stand- 
ing), made better growth than the bermuda last 
season and the dry weather combined to retard 
it to such an extent that in August, when we 
cut the bushes and weeds with hoes, a great 
many bare spots of ground could be seen. The 



152 SUEE FEED CEOPS 

weather continued dry through the fall and 
winter and the following spring and snmmer 
was so dry that np to August of this year very 
little bermuda could be seen. After the late 
rains set in, a thick growth of a kind of wire 
grass covered the ground and I said ' Goodbye, 
bermuda'. In September I noticed some suspi- 
cious stems of a greener hue protruding above 
the mat of wild grass and a few days after I 
made an inspection when, lo and behold, the 
bermuda was a solid turf over almost the entire 
field.'' 

248. Mcintosh County, Eastern Oklahoma. 

'^Eegarding bermuda grass, I wish to report 
that in this section, that which was set out last 
year did not get a good start, froze out last 
winter, excepting the original spots where first 
planted. These spots were slow in coming out 
this spring on account of the cold weather and 
three weeks ago I thought even the original 
spots were entirely frozen out; but the last ten 
days of hot weather has started up the grass 
wonderfully and it is now spreading in good 
shape. I am now putting in twenty acres all in 
bermuda for pasture. Besides, I am putting it 
on each of my places with the intention of 
having a pasture on each place. The country 
around Eufaula has less pasture land on ac- 
count of sc much timber and what is cleared is 
generally devoted to cotton. I started putting 
in the twenty acres three years ago and had 
heard so much about bermuda taking the 



THE PASTURE 153 

country that I loaded a few pieces in the back 
of my bnggy, went out to this twenty acres and 
stuck a few spots in what I thought was reason- 
able distance over the twenty acres, confidently 
expecting from what I had heard that by fall I 
would have twenty acres of bermuda pasture. 
This is the third year and I do not believe that 
any one of these spots is a foot in width and I 
am now planting it out considerably closer to- 
gether than I did three years ago/^ 

249. Hughes County, Eastern Oklahoma. '*In 
1910, we got bermuda roots from the railroad 
banks and planted around the heads of ditches 
in field, washed there in 1908. The ground was 
foul and there was little chance to cultivate, 
but in some places the grass has a good turf and 
is doing fine. It is dead in but few places; gen- 
eral condition good. ' ' 

250. Cherokee County, Eastern Oklahoma. 
^'My own experience with bermuda grass for 
the last three or four years has brought me to 
the conclusion that so far as Eastern Oklahoma 
is concerned, bermuda is a nuisance and should 
be classed with Johnson grass, now outlawed 
by the state. About four years ago, I was in- 
duced by a well-meaning friend to set my yard 
and lawn with bermuda grass, and the result- 
so far as getting a lawn was concerned— was all 
that could be desired. We soon had a thick, 
heavy set coat of grass all over the yard. But 
alas! Through the carelessness of someone, a 



154 SUEE' FEED CROPS 

few sprigs or joints of bermuda had found their 
way into the feedyard, from which place the 
bermuda must have been transferred to the 
cultivated fields when the manure from those 
lots was hauled out there. Anyway, the ber- 
muda is there; about that there is no doubt, I 
can assure you. I have about three acres in 
strawberries, which is one of the most appre- 
ciated spots on the farm, and here the bermuda 
has been doing its best to rob the family of one 
of its choice assets, and an income of several 
hundred dollars per season. Seven different 
times did we eradicate (!) the bermuda from 
our strawberry field last spring and summer. 
And the last cleaning out was so thorough that 
not a joint of bermuda grass could be seen any- 
where, and happy in the thought that at last 
our bitter and relentless foe had been con- 
quered, we placed the mulch on our strawberry 
patch and serenely awaited the coming of 
spring. Last week I noticed the new growth 
of an extra early spring. I proceeded to un- 
cover my strawberry plants. I found the plants 
to have made a feeble start at growth, but I 
noticed something else coming to life — a few 
scattering green tender sprigs of bermuda here 
and there indicated too plainly that the pros- 
pect of a bermuda crop is much better than the 
prospect of a strawberry crop. And that is the 
identical spot over which we toiled during the 
long and weary months of last summer and fall. 
Under the snug and warm cover of the mulch, 



THE PASTURE 155 

the fiendish stuff had been making preparation 
for a final battle and complete victory to anni- 
hilate the last remnant of my once prosperous 
berry field. Why the Eastern, and especially 
the Northeastern Oklahoma farmer, should 
have any desire to raise bermuda grass is more 
than I can understand, and in this section of 
the state, alfalfa and clover will grow to perfec- 
tion almost anywhere, and as these grasses are 
far superior in feeding value as well as in build- 
ing up depleted soils, it would seem folly to ex- 
periment with something of doubtful value/' 

251. General Considerations. W. D. Bentley, 
who has observed bermuda grass very closely 
in Texas and Oklahoma, says : ' ' The idea seems 
to be general that all a farmer has to do to get a 
permanent bermuda grass pasture is to procure 
the roots, scatter them on the ground and run a 
harrow or cultivator over them and in a short 
time the land will be set forever and that it will 
soon spread and cover the whole farm. 

^^ Nothing is farther from the facts. The 
farmer in Oklahoma who gets and keeps a ber- 
muda grass pasture must give it careful, intelli- 
gent care. For a permanent tame grass pasture, 
over a large section of Oklahoma, bermuda 
grass is the only hope and it is well worth the 
expense and labor necessary to get it and 
keep it. 

^^ Drouth, cold and shade kill bermuda grass. 
The drouth and cold of the last fall and winter 



156 SURE FEED CROPS 

almost ruined the bermuda grass in many 
places. In some sections of Western Oklahoma, 
farmers are reporting all their bermuda grass 
dead, but I think they will find in most places 
enough of it is still alive to give them another 
start. I have visited a large number of ber- 
muda grass plats within the last few weeks on 
the light sandy lands of Western Oklahoma and 
find all of them badly damaged but none of 
them entirely killed out. I am more than ever 
convinced that the bermuda grass has not been 
given a square deal in this section. On every 
plat that I examined except two, the bermuda 
had been planted near the front door, or in the 
chicken or calf lot, or near the farm buildings 
where every living animal on the farm could get 
to it. The wonder of it is that any of it lived 
through the long drouth after such treatment. 

^^The best plat visited was a two-acre patch 
that after a good set had been secured was 
plowed under with a sulky turning plow to kill 
the weeds. The weeds were killed and the ber- 
muda benefited. 

*^ Those who buy bermuda roots this year may 
expect some dead roots among the live ones; 
they are there and can't be separated. How- 
ever, the live roots in each sack will be worth 
many dollars to every farmer who takes proper 
care of them and gives them a fair chance.'* 

252. Specific Questions. Location with refer- 
ence to temperature and average rainfall, char- 
acter of soil, the purposes for which bermuda 



THE PASTURE 157 

grass is desired, and numerous other factors 
enter into any consideration of the grass prob- 
lem on a given farm. A few of such questions 
and replies are included here. 

253. Afraid of it. ' ' I wish to know if one can 
keep bermuda grass where he wants it or not, 
and if one can kill it or not. I have about six 
or seven acres in my farm which is very sandy 
and I can't raise any wheat, corn, or oats. I 
would like to put it to bermuda if the bermuda 
wouldn't scatter or keep going. I have good 
wheat ground all around this patch of sand.''— 
Alfalfa county, Western Oklahoma. The only 
danger which will confront you with your ber- 
muda grass is that it may freeze out in very 
hard winters on your sandy land. You are a 
little far north for it to grow vigorously and it 
certainly will never make any trouble for you, 
except that it will not spread fast enough to suit 
you when once you learn what this grass will 
do for you. 

254. Varieties of Bermuda. ^ ' I am greatly in- 
terested in bermuda grass, but have a hard time 
getting a good start. Are there two kinds, the 
big and little bermuda? If so, which is the 
better 1 My subsoil is a clay. Would you advise 
subsoil plowing in such to get more space for 
moisture?"— Lincoln county, Central Okla- 
homa. There are two varieties of bermuda 
grass of equal resistance to cold; one of them 
growing coarse and rather erect; the other fine 



158 SURE FEED CROPS 

and sticking closely to the soil. For general 
farm purposes, the coarse variety is best and 
the only way to get it is to observe bermuda 
wherever yon see it growing and when a satis- 
factory patch is found, get a start from it. It is 
not worth while to subsoil for bermuda but it 
will be well for you to plow the land as deep 
as possible during the winter and plant the ber- 
muda in April and May in rows about three feet 
apart, so that it may be cultivated a few times 
if necessary. 

255. Bermuda in Sod. '^Can T get a set of 
bermuda by setting in furrows three feet each 
way in a native pasture while the stock are run- 
ning on it, or would it be better to plow out a 
little at a time and fence it offT'— Grady 
county. Central Oklahoma. You can get a stand 
of bermuda by planting it as you suggest, but 
it will take from two to five years to get a sod, 
depending upon the amount of native sod which 
is left and the closeness with which you pasture. 

256. Starting in Pasture. ^ ^ Do you think ber- 
muda would be a success on the Plains of Lamb 
county, Texas Panhandle, with a 3500-foot alti- 
tude? There is some growing here in the yard 
at the ranch under large cottonwood trees. 
Could we start it in the short grass of our pas- 
tures? Please give your opinion, as I wish to 
read it at our farmers' meeting." There is a 
very good chance for you to succeed with ber- 
muda grass when you once get it established. 



THE PASTURE 159 

You are far enough south so that the winters 
probably will not kill it out. It will be a rather 
slow job to get it established in short grass 
pasture, but it is worth trying. Break out nar- 
row strips a rod apart in your pastures, disk it 
thoroughly and plant the bermuda roots in 
April or May. This work may be done easily by 
marking out a furrow and stringing the roots 
along in it, putting a small piece of the roots 
every foot or two in the row and covering com- 
pletely. 

257. Sandy Loam Pasture. ''I have ten acres 
I want to seed to pasture in the spring. It is 
the highest land I have, though it's valley land 
and lies close up to foot of hill; light sandy 
loam, a good deal of sand in soil, underlaid with 
red clay. AYhat kind of grass would you advise 
me to sow! Would it grow alfalfa f — Hughes 
county, Eastern Oklahoma. The only grass 
which may be depended upon to succeed for 
pasture is bermuda. This grass is best started 
by planting the roots. The land should be 
plowed as soon as possible and worked down 
well. The roots may be planted at any time 
from March 1st to July 1st and should be 
dropped in rows and covered much the same as 
though you were planting potatoes. Alfalfa 
would not be expected to do well on such soil 
in your locality, and certainly not for pasture. 

258. On Gumbo Land. ' ' I have underbrushed 
and pretty well cleared ten acres of gumbo with 



160 SURE FEED CROPS 

quite a number of dead trees still remaining. 
Intend to clean the brush up well and sow to 
pasture without first breaking. Under the 
above conditions which of the following grasses 
would you sow: Kentucky blue grass, English 
blue grass, red top, orchard grass, or timothy! 
Which is the easiest to set ? Have a couple of 
acres of bermuda up on the prairie well set, 
but am afraid to try it on heavy land as above." 
— Tulsa county. Eastern Oklahoma. There is 
no grass which will do as well as bermuda on 
your gumbo land. English blue grass and or- 
chard grass are next in likelihood of giving you 
some measure of success. Kentucky blue grass 
might do fairly well during the wet seasons and, 
unless the ground is rather moist, red top will 
not do very well. Bermuda grass is really at its 
best on gumbo soils when once established. It 
takes hold and covers that sort of land very 
quickly. 

259. Upland Pasture. * 'I have about three or 
four acres of heavy timbered upland that I have 
cut off all but enough scattering trees to make 
it parklike. I wish to sow or set this in some- 
thing that will make summer and winter pas- 
ture for hogs and cows. Recommend some- 
thing.'' — Mcintosh county, Eastern Oklahoma. 
The best grass for you to plant for permanent 
pasture on your upland is bermuda. This 
should be started by planting the roots at any 
time from March until July. If in the fall, after 



THE PASTUEE 161 

the grass is set, you will sow seed of wliite 
clover and vetch right on the sod, it will help 
make winter pasture. 

260. Bermuda hay is clean and excellent for 
feeding to horses. It contains 9.7 protein and 
1.24 percent, fat; timothy hay contains 5.9 per- 
cent, protein and 2.5 percent, fat; Kentucky 
blue grass hay contains 7.8 percent, protein and 
3.9 percent, fat. Comparative feeding trials 
have shown bermuda hay to be of about the 
same value as timothy hay for horse feed. It is 
probable that bermuda hay does not possess 
high value as feed for dairy and other cattle. 
A few phenomenal yields of bermuda hay are 
on record. At the Oklahoma Agricultural Ex- 
periment Station in 1905, a yield of 2584 pounds 
of cured bermuda hay per acre was obtained 
from two and one-half acres within three 
months after planting bermuda roots in rows 
three feet apart. But the soil was in an excel- 
lent state of cultivation and the rainfall during 
the three months was 14.13 inches. The fol- 
lowing season, a total of 5.85 tons of cured ber- 
muda hay per acre was obtained from this same 
field in three cuttings. But such yields as this 
should not be expected and this same field 
quickly diminished in production. Bermuda is 
a pasture grass and in the Central Southwest, 
cannot be depended upon for regular and con- 
tinuous yields of hay. 

261. For hog pasture, when well established 



162 SUEE FEED CROPS 

on good land, bermuda grass has no superior. 
In the spring of 1911, a swine breeder in Grant 
connty, Central Oklahoma, reported that the 
previous season, he pastured thirteen hogs all 
summer on thirty square rods of bermuda grass 
and that they did well. That was at the rate of 
sixty-nine hogs to the acre, and yet he reported 
bermuda grass as ^'not satisfactory" in his lo- 
cality. An extensive feeder of market hogs in 
Pottawatomie county, Central Oklahoma, who 
has one hundred acres of alfalfa on bottom 
land and forty acres of bermuda grass on sandy 
slope land not suited to alfalfa, states that an 
acre of his bermuda grass during a season turns 
off more gain in weight of hogs than he obtains 
from an acre of alfalfa. And further, the stand 
of alfalfa is damaged by pasturing with hogs, 
while the stand of bermuda is actually im- 
proved, the rooting of the hogs preventing it 
from getting sodbound. The composition of 
bermuda grass is such that hogs receiving no 
other feed have a more nearly balanced ration 
when pastured on bermuda grass than when 
pastured on alfalfa. Each spring, the bermuda 
hog pasture should be thoroughly disked and 
leveled in March. 

262. Bermuda pastures become sodbound 

after a few years and often yield but little pas- 
ture. They may be rejuvenated by plowing with 
a sod plow in March and thoroughly disking. 
Within a few weeks, new and vigorous growth 



THE PASTURE 163 

will appear and the yields will be much im- 
proved. 

263. Eradicating bermuda grass is no easy- 
task among small fruits, but it is easily accom- 
plished in cultivated fields. Shallow plowing 
during dry periods disposes of much of it. Plow- 
ing shallow in the early winter and exposing the 
underground stems to freezing is fatal to it in 
the average winter. If such land is sown to 
oats, to be followed with cowpeas after har- 
vest, thus shading the ground throughout the 
season, eradication will be practically com- 
plete. But bermuda grass should be planted only 
where it is wanted permanently for pasture. 
It is never regarded as a pest by those who have 
livestock to consume it; only those who grow 
cotton and have no use for grass fear its spread. 

264. Bermuda grass produces seed in Okla- 
homa. If the manure from livestock fed ber- 
muda hay or pastured on bermuda which has 
matured seed heads is put on cultivated fields, 
small patches of the grass are almost certain 
to start from the seed. Such manure is thus 
undesirable for placing on the garden or about 
small fruits. But the young bermuda grass may 
easily be killed in the cultivated fields and the 
actual spreading of bermuda from this source 
is really very slight. 



^164 SUEE FEED CROPS 

OTHER GRASSES AND CLOVERS 

265. Many other grasses are sown and occa- 
sionally some of them seem to promise success, 
only to fail entirely when the test of the dry 
year comes with its great need for feed for live- 
stock. A few of these are considered in the 
answers to inquiries which follow, but their 
being included here should not be taken to 
mean that any of them are to be regarded as 
sure feed crops. 

266. Canada blue grass. ** Please let me know 
the value of Canada blue grass as a grass for 
Western Oklahoma. I have some rough land 
that doesn't amount to much as pasture, having 
a bunch grass on it, inclined to be sand grass. 
What should I put on it for better returns?''— 
Texas county. Western Oklahoma. Canada 
blue grass is of value only in the far north, and 
it is not likely to do a thing in your locality. 
Get on hand a supply of seed of bromus inermis, 
and whenever you strike a period of plenty of 
rain, go out and scatter some of the seed over 
your pasture land. If you keep this up for a 
few years, you will be giving bromus inermis 
the best possible test and it is probably the only 
grass which may possibly improve your native 
pastures. 

267. Timothy and Red Top. *'What about 
timothy, red top, or red clover? What do you 
think of these for hav in the east side of the 



THE PASTUEE 165 

state?"— LeFlore county, Eastern Oklahoma. 
The last few years have not been very good 
years for timothy, red top, and red clover even 
in Eastern Oklahoma. Ultimately yon will 
place your dependence in bermuda and alfalfa, 
but before that time comes, the eastern counties 
will have to go through a period of expensive 
experiences with timothy and clover. On the 
moister lands, red top will do very well, and 
there will be many years in which timothy and 
clover will pay. Fine timothy has been grown 
in Ottawa county and also some excellent red 
top. 

268. Japan Clover. *^Do you think Japan 
clover would make a good hay crop for this part 
of Oklahoma? I would like very much to sow 
some kind of hay crop on upland that would 
beat alfalfa. I have been reading a good deal 
about Japan clover and came to the conclu- 
sion that if it would do well in Oklahoma, I 
would like to get some."— Custer county, 
Western Oklahoma. Japan clover is of ab- 
solutely no account in your part of Okla- 
homa. In very wet years it grows as far west 
as Pottawatomie county, but in years like the 
last two or three, western Arkansas is about 
the western limit of profitable growth of Japan 
clover. It will be a long time before you will 
find any hay crop that will beat alfalfa on 
Custer county uplands where alfalfa will grow. 
The last three years have, of course, been very 
hard on the crop, but it will rain again, and 



166 SUEE FEED CEOPS 

when it rains even a little bit, your Custer 
county hills are just the stuff for alfalfa. 

269. Sand Lucerne. ^'I wish to ask about 
sand lucerne. I have read about it and am trying 
to locate some one who raises it. I have been 
informed that it thrives and does well on very 
sandy soil or nearly all soils. If this forage 
plant is as good as I have been informed it is, 
it will be of great interest to very many farmers. 
Many parts of Oklahoma have a great deal of 
sand in the soil which makes it very hard to get 
a stand of alfalfa or to get any kind of grass 
crop to stay on the ground for pasture and hay 
land.''— Kingfisher county, Central Oklahoma. 
Sand lucerne is very similar to alfalfa, but 
more spreading in its habit of growth. The 
seeds are somewhat smaller than alfalfa seed. 
At the Michigan Experiment Station, the aver- 
age yield during four years was at the rate of 
over five tons of cured hay per acre. They ob- 
tained from three to four cuttings per season. 
Try it on only a small scale and sow the seed 
late in March or early in April at the rate of 
about fifteen pounds of seed per acre. The land 
should be prepared as for alfalfa seeding. 

270. Curly Mesquite. ''I send you sample of 
grass and would like to know what it is. It 
seems to be very hardy and is spreading over 
the prairie and setting on the hardpan spots. 
Some call it bermuda and some say it is not. 
Where it grows it kills out all the weeds and 



THE PASTURE 167 

other grass. All kinds of stock seem to like it. 
Could not say how tall it gets as the stock keep 
it eaten down.''— Rogers county, Eastern Ok- 
lahoma. The sample of grass which you en- 
closed is curly or creeping mesquite. It is some- 
what similar in appearance and habit of growth 
to bermuda. It is an excellent grass and, while 
it does not yield as much pasture as bermuda 
does, there is no danger of its spreading and 
becoming troublesome. With your heavy aver- 
age rainfall, it should furnish quite a lot of 
pasture through the summer. This is the most 
promising pasture grass for the northwestern 
fourth of Oklahoma, where bermuda grass does 
not make satisfactory growth. The mesquite 
occupies the pastures there after the coarser 
grasses disappear. 

271. Bromus Inermis. '^ Is it your impression 
that Bromus Inermis and English blue grass, or 
either, is likely to be of value for either pasture 
or for hay in Grant county, Oklahoma ! ' ' There 
is a bare possibility that bromus inermis may 
develop to be of some value as a pasture in 
Grant county, but it is a slim chance. English 
blue grass in favorable years might make some- 
thing of a crop, but in dry years it would fail 
absolutely. The difficulty with bromus inermis 
seems to^ be that it gets too hot for it down 
here. 

'^I have a piece of ground I have been trying 
to get set to bermuda but it is so tight the ber- 
muda doesn't seem to do any better than the 



168 SURE FEED CEOPS 

native grass. I want to know what about sow- 
ing brome grass. Is it adapted to this locality? 
How does it compare with the other grasses as 
hay and pasture? When once set, does it ever 
have to be replanted?''— Washita county, Cen- 
tral Oklahoma. It is of no value for your local- 
ity. There is nothing better than bermuda grass 
and you must not be discouraged, because the 
last two years have been very poor years for 
getting bermuda started. 

272. Grasses for Eastern Kansas. **Cowpeas 
and kafircorn have done their part to bring my 
stock through two winters. I would like your 
advice about sowing grass seed in thin timber. 
I have a small creek bottom farm about one- 
third of which is now in alfalfa. There are a 
few acres of timber along the creek and the trees 
are large and very little undergrowth; the wild 
rye affords some early pasture. The soil is a 
heavy black loam, free from rocks or gravel. 
Will Alsike clover and timothy do well on such 
land. What grass would you recommend try- 
ing? The land is sometimes partly flooded by 
backwater, but is ordinarily well drained. I 
cleared some very low ground this year and in- 
tend to give bermuda a tryout if I can get 
hardy roots. Will bermuda stand much 
shade ?" — Greenwood county, Kansas. In your 
locality you can improve the grasses in your 
timber land by sowing at any time in the spring 
a mixture of Kentucky blue grass, English blue 
grass, orchard grass, and white clover seed. 



THE PASTUEE 169 

Just scatter tlie seeds about, preferably during 
a rain, and trust to nature to do the rest; also 
repeat the sowing in September. If you will 
keep this up for a few years, not sowing a great 
deal of seed at a time, but sowing a little at 
several times each spring and fall, you will ulti- 
mately have a fine pasture along your creek. 
Timothy is not a good pasture grass. It would 
do no harm to include a little Alsike clover in 
the mixture which you sow. Bermuda will not 
do any good in dense shade. If there are some 
sunny slopes facing the south in the pasture, 
there is the place to plant bermuda. 

273. Sweet Clover. ^^Some two or three farm- 
ers in Grady county have asked me about the 
value of a forage plant called ^melilotus', and 
what properties it contains for feeding pur- 
poses. If there have been any experiments 
made with reference to this plant, I shall be 
very glad to have the result of these experi- 
ments. The plant very much resembles alfalfa, 
its growth and character being very similar but 
it is my understanding that it has to be re- 
planted every two years. Any information 
that you can give me along the above lines will 
be greatly appreciated."— Grady county. Cen- 
tral Oklahoma. It is sweet clover that the farm- 
ers have been talking to you about. There 
are two species of it, scientifically designated 
as Melilotus alba and Melilotus officinalis. The 
former is also called Bokhara clover, White 
Melilot, and tree clover. It has white blossoms. 



170 SUEE FEED CEOPS 

The other has yellow blossoms and is some- 
times called Yellow clover. The variety with 
white blossoms is the one usually grown. It 
sometimes seems that the chief value of sweet 
clover is to start an argument. Unquestion- 
ably it furnishes excellent pasture for bees, and 
the nodule-forming bacteria which appear on 
the roots of sweet clover are probably identical 
with those which work on alfalfa to its great 
benefit. Sweet clover also possesses the ability 
to grow on almost any sort of soil and might be 
used to great advantage to build up very sandy 
soils and make them fertile and productive. 
One progressive farmer has purchased several 
quarter-sections of waste sandy land along the 
South Canadian river. He said recently that 
he has a few acres of sweet clover and that it 
furnished excellent pasture for a lot of young 
mules which he had on the place. He said that 
it was growing vigorously while the alfalfa 
nearby had suspended operations during the 
dry weather. He intends to sow quite a lot 
more of it and said that hay, which he made 
of sweet clover, before the plants began bloom- 
ing was eaten readily by his stock. If hay is 
not made until after the plants bloom, it is 
coarse and strong and does not seem to be 
relished by animals of any sort. Those who 
regard sweet clover as a pasture crop say that 
they get the most benefit out of it very early in 
the spring before other things begin to grow. 
There is a place for extensive sowing of sweet 



THE PASTURE 171 

clover on the sandy lands along the Cimarron, 
South Canadian, and Red rivers. It will grow 
on lands where nothing else will grow profit- 
ably and should be used only in such locations. 
Only those who are engaged in the stock busi- 
ness can expect to use sweet clover to advan- 
tage. They will find that the land on which 
they grow it will increase in fertility and that 
plowing under a good crop will be of great 
benefit to the soil. The seed may be sown on 
sandy lands without previous preparation, at 
the rate of ten to fifteen pounds per acre fol- 
lowed by disking or harrowing. There is no 
danger whatever of its becoming a troublesome 
weed, although many people seem to fear it. 
The plant is a biennial, producing seed the 
second year after it is sown and if properly 
managed, enough seed will mature to keep the 
land reseeded. Waste places might profitably 
be sown to this crop on many farms, and if bees 
are kept, the honey will return a profit from 
land which otherwise would be unproductive. 

274. Johnson Grass. It is a violation of law 
to sow the seed of Johnson grass or to permit 
it to mature seed in Oklahoma. Nearly all farm- 
ers consider this grass a pest, though some 
regard it as a valuable grass producing feed in 
very unfavorable seasons. This it unquestion- 
ably does, but the rapidity with which it spreads 
and its persistence in cultivated fields are very 
objectionable features. Johnson grass is used 



172 SUEE FEED CROPS 

largely as a hay crop in Texas, where mncli 
good land has been abandoned to the grass. It 
is not a satisfactory pasture grass, yielding but 
little after a few years of pasturing unless 
plowed up and given another start. 

The ability of Johnson grass to withstand 
conditions of extreme drouth and produce feed 
appeals to many, as is shown by the following: 

A farmer living in Ellis county, Western Ok- 
lahoma, says: **We people living in Western 
Oklahoma must have Johnson grass instead of 
bermuda and alfalfa, as they are not successful 
in this locality. The pasture problem is con- 
fronting us more than anything else, and I am 
well satisfied that if a lot of these people had 
Johnson grass instead of sand piles along the 
fences, they would reduce some of the mort- 
gages. A four-acre patch of alfalfa, good stand, 
sowed a year ago last spring, has yielded about 
one and one-half tons of hay this season. Under 
the same conditions, Johnson grass would have 
made twenty tons.'' 

Another who lives in the extreme western 
end of Cimarron county, Oklahoma, on the 
Plains, writes: ^^I have a few small patches 
of Johnson grass, and it is the only living 
vegetation in sight. I am like some others who 
would like to see the Johnson grass law re- 
pealed. I have observed Johnson grass for six- 
teen years here and don 't know that it has ever 
hurt anyone, while I do know that it has saved 
the life of many a poor cow. I think it the 



THE PASTURE 173 

best and most reliable feed for this country, 
especially where it can be disked and harrowed 
each year. I also find that my best land is 
where Johnson grass has grown for years.'' 

A Custer county, Western Oklahoma, stock- 
man writes: *^I want to sanction the suggestion 
that the Johnson grass law be repealed. That 
law is a crime against the stock and stock- 
raisers of Western Oklahoma. What if it is 
hard to kill out? Ten acres would be worth 
more than one hundred acres of any other grass 
for pasture or hay. It beats sunflowers and 
cockleburs and other weeds that are not legis- 
lated against. I would like to sow ten acres.'' 

Another writing from Caddo county. Central 
Oklahoma, says: *^The views of the man who 
likes Johnson grass suit me exactly. The John- 
son grass law which we have is a mistake. The 
farmers of Oklahoma ought to have a right to 
grow what they can do best with. I have forty 
acres with spots of Johnson grass in it. If it 
had not been for the law, I could have made 
more money on that forty acres during the past 
three years than I have made from all my farm 
of 160 acres. The law is a farce and ought to 
be repealed." 

Another writes from Carter county, Central 
Oklahoma: ^^I have been two years trying to 
get a sod of bermuda grass on twenty acres and 
my experience has been that the hardiest of it 
all has looked sick during our last dry spell 
and if I had to depend on it for pasture for my 



174 SURE FEED CEOPS 

milk cows, I would have been up against a 
high wall. The crop that saved the day when 
it was dry looks good to me. On land not one 
bit better than that where I have my bermuda, 
I have twenty acres of Johnson grass. That 
twenty acres the first of the spring pastured 
twenty-five head. About four weeks ago the 
pasture began to get short so we took out six 
head, leaving ninoteen in there and they are 
doing well. The prairie hay has been too short 
to cut yet. My little patch of Johnson grass 
has been cut once and is now ready again. Now 
the way I am fixed is this: I have only sixty 
acres and sixty head of stock. My farm has to 
produce enough food for my stock through the 
winter and I want every foot to produce every 
bit it will. It is against the law to sow Johnson 
grass but don't you think it would be a good 
thing to try and have that law repealed?" 

But the following from a farmer in Logan 
county, Central Oklahoma, represents the feel- 
ing of many others: *'Now that those friends 
of Johnson grass have expressed themselves, I 
ask leave to submit a few reasons on the other 
side. I, too, speak from experience; an expe- 
rience that has been costly, and the end is not 
yet. A neighbor of mine sowed some seed of 
Johnson grass. He wanted a good, sure pasture 
and such a mess as he has after seven or eight 
years of effort to add to and cut out, is enough 
to make a decent farmer blush for the looks 
of that forty. Much of his land lies along a 



THE PASTUEE 175 

large creek and just across the road and down 
the creek I have an Indian lease of eighty acres. 
The overflows of the creek carry the seeds 
across my eighty and in defiance of my strenu- 
ous efforts to control the pest, my crops are 
damaged every year, and each succeeding year 
I have more work to do cultivating crops with 
less and less profit for my labor. We have that 
field in cotton this year and just last week with 
the mercury 100 in the shade, I went over the 
field and cut off a big sack full of seed tops, 
and I must keep up the cuttings until frost or 
have more stools next year. Now I ask in all 
fairness : Has a man any moral right to compel 
his fellowmen to undergo such labor and sus- 
tain such lossf 

The following inquiry and answer are fairly 
typical of conditions where Johnson grass is 
well distributed: ''I am thinking of buying 100 
acres of good land, two miles from town, one- 
fourth mile to good school. The land can be 
bought cheap, lies well, good water, but there 
is a big lot of Johnson grass, the great terror 
of this section, on it. I am thinking of buying 
this land for a stock farm. What do you think 
of it I Is Johnson grass any good, or do you 
know anything of it? Will it make good pas- 
ture? In case I should ever want to cultivate 
the land, could the Johnson grass be killed out 
for good? Has the Johnson grass law ever 
been enforced in this state? Would it inter- 
fere with the success of the farm ! Or would it 



176 SUEE FEED CROPS 

pay better to buy bottom land at a big price 
twelve miles from town and sow alfalfa? Any 
liglit you can give will be appreciated. In case 
you don't know how to advise, just tell me 
what you would do under similar circum- 
stances.'' — Stephens county, Central Okla- 
homa. If ,jou want this for a stock farm, do 
not hesitate for. a minute about buying it and 
going to it. Where th6. Johnson grass is thick- 
est, you may make hay of itland^dt'^s ahead of 
timothy in feeding value, if alsp^wpL' furnish 
pasture for a time, but if heavily' pastured, pro- 
duces very little growth. You should take up 
the work of eradicating the grass systemati- 
cally by fencing a portion of the farm, pastur- 
ing it heavily through the summer season, 
plowing shallow in November and pasturing 
with hogs and cattle, then' l^fer disking out 
some more ..of the ' underground stems so the 
stock can eat them.:^''Tf yo^i will follow this 
treatment with a crop^of oaM in the spring and 
then after oats harx^esi^ plow the land and go 
ovm' the field several /times, taking out any 
clumps of the gr^ss which may appear, and 
sow alfalfa in the fall, you will have practically 
cleaned out the Johnson grass. The Johnson 
grass law has never been fully enforced in this 
state and it is not likely to be. If you do not 
wish to grow alfalfa, the oats may be followed 
by wheat in the fall and then cowpeas should 
be planted on the wheat stubble, and by the fol- 
lowing spring, if you work at the job of taking 



THE PASTUEE 177 

out the few clumps of Johnson grass which' 
may be left, you will have the land in first class 
shape for cultivation. All of the time you are 
doing this, you may be making good use of the 
rest of the Johnson grass by pasturing it and 
making hay off of some of it. When you make 
hay, the grass should be cut before the seeds 
have formed, as otherwise the manure will 
spread the grass all over the place. 



ANNUAL PASTURE CROPS 

275. ' Few annual pasture crops are certain to 
produce feed in seasons of extreme drouth. But 
the timely planting of such of these crops as 
are reasonably successful under average con- 
ditions may, at little expense, be made to sup- 
plement other feed crops. The use of sorghum 
(192), cowpeas (170), and peanuts (184) for 
pasture has previously been discussed. 

276. Wheat and rye, sown in September or 
October, sometimes furnish profitable winter 
pasture for horses, cattle, and hogs, and often 
do not. Soft wheat yields more pasture than 
hard varieties. Where stalkfields are to be pas- 
tured during the winter, it is profitable to sow 
at least a portion of them to wheat or rye, for 
pasture alone. When wheat is to be harvested 
for grain, pasturing should be discontinued not 
later than March 1st, if a full yield is desired. 



178 SUEE FEED CEOPg 

277. For early hog pasture, early sown oats 
is generally satisfactory. Three pounds of seed 
of Dwarf Essex rape to the acre may be sown 
with two to three bushels of oats. This should 
be ready to pasture in April and, after being 
pastured off, may be followed with sorghum, 
cowpeas, or peanuts, planted in rows three and 
one-half feet apart. Eape for early summer 
pasture should be drilled, about corn-planting 
time, in rows wide enough apart to cultivate. 
In very dry seasons, neither oats nor rape will 
provide much pasture, and sorghum (193) 
should be provided for late summer pasture, 
after rape has passed its period of profitable 
growth. 



RAINFALL AND CROPS 

By GEORGE L. BISHOP. 

West of Meridian 98, in Oklahoma, means 
practically the main line of the Rock Island 
Railroad north and south, through Kingfisher, 
El Reno, Chickasha, Duncan, etc. West of this 
line we begin to approach that part of the 
country which is coming to be known as the 
dry -farming section. The term dry-farming is 
of recent origin, and, though it is a misnomer, 
the name is being accepted and understood to 
mean that method of farming which depends on 
the storing and conserving in the soil of a short 
or unseasonable rainfall as an insurance against 
drouth. Adaptation of crops and certain 
methods of soil culture perform very important 
duties in the system of dry-farming, but avail- 
able moisture more than any other one thing 
controls the results in crop yield. This avail- 
able moisture is determined first by the average 
rainfall of any country or locality. So the 
extent to which Western Oklahoma, or any part 
of Oklahoma, may be interested in or dependent 
upon dry-farming crops and cultural methods, 
may be ascertained by looking up its average 
rainfall for ten years or more. The rainfall for 
that section of the state lying along Meridian 
98 ranges from fifteen to fifty inches, with an 

179 



180 SURE FEED CROPS 

average for the last thirty years of a little more 
than thirty inches. Some ten-year averages in 
certain localities ran as high as thirty-four 
inches, and in other loaclities, along the same 
line, as low as twenty-eight inches. 

For the four wet years of 1905-6-7-8 jnst pre- 
ceding the last three dry years, the rainfall for 
Western Oklahoma was from five to fifteen 
inches above normal. The average for those 
four years was more than ten inches greater 
than the general average for the years which 
had gone before and the three which have fol- 
lowed immediately after. 

For instance at Chickasha the average rain- 
fall for those four years was, in whole numbers 
thirty-nine inches; while the average for the 
years before and the three which have come 
since, is only twenty-one inches. The ten-year 
average for Chickasha, not including 1911, is 
less than thirty inches. 

Hobart, some sixty miles west of Chickasha, 
has an average rainfall for the four rainy sea- 
sons of thirty-eight inches. But for the years 
before and for the three which have just passed, 
the average is only twenty inches. For all the 
years for which we have records, there is found 
to be an average annual rainfall for Hobart, 
Kiowa county, right on Meridian 99, of twenty- 
seven and a half inches. For Mangum, Greer 
county, twenty-five miles west of Hobart, where 
we have records for twenty years, there is 
shown an average rainfall of a little more than 



EAINFALL AND CROPS 181 

twenty-six inches. Here the average for the 
four wet years was thirty-six and a half, show- 
ing an increase of ten inches over the average 
for the twenty years, including the four wet 
ones. 

If we begin farther north and go west, we 
find the difference and gradual decrease is 
maintained in about the same proportion. Ft. 
Reno, on Meridian 98, with records for prac- 
tically thirty years, shows an average annual 
rainfall of about thirty inches, while Erick, in 
Beckham county, one hundred miles west, has 
an average of twenty-six, and Arapaho, Custer 
county, about half way between El Reno and 
Erick, has an average for eighteen years of 
twenty-eight inches. As you go north to the 
Kansas line the rainfall seems to be a little more 
regular in its habits, but with a little lower 
average. For instance the north tier of 
counties and the northwest counties have had 
a much nearer normal rainfall for the last three 
years than the southwest counties. Go on up 
into Kansas, and go west beginning with Man- 
hattan fqr fifty years. Hays for forty years, and 
Dodge City for forty years, and we find an 
average, in whole numbers, of 31, 23, and 20 
inches, respectively. 

The four successive years of unusual precipi- 
tation certainly had many of us ready to accept 
the theory that ^*the rainfall follows the plow.'' 
But the three years which have followed should 
leave us more willing than ever to be guided 



182 SUEE l^^ED CEOPS 

by the records in clioosing the methods of cul- 
ture, and kind of crops with which we are to 
build a permanent and profitable agriculture 
for Western Oklahoma. 

Eecords for forty years at Ft. Sill, Comanche 
county, show that, as a rule, a year of unusual 
rainfall is followed by a year of short rainfall, 
and sometimes two short ones, and in one period 
live years with an average of only twenty-four 
inches come in succession. Then as if to prove 
that one extreme follows another, there fol- 
lowed three years with an average of forty 
inches. The next year was the year 1901, which 
many of us remember. It was the dryest for 
thirty years, with only sixteen inches of rain 
for the entire year. Then back to the other ex- 
treme, with a rainfall for 1902 of nearly forty- 
seven inches. Then a couple of short years 
before starting in with fifty inches for 1905, the 
first of the four wet years, which we have men- 
tioned. Then, perhaps, to settle for all time 
this idea of permanent increase in rainfall, 
came 1910 with a little more than fourteen 
inches. With all these ups and downs. Ft. Sill 
shows an average rainfall of thirty inches for 
forty years. 

The records show that we may expect about 
one-third of each year's rainfall from Septem- 
ber to February, inclusive. That is, where the 
average rainfall is thirty inches, ten inches as 
a rule will fall in the autumn and winter 
months. It also shows that seven of the ten 



RAINFALL AND CROPS 183 

inches iisnally fall in September, October, and 
November, the other three in December, January, 
and February. But there are a few sharp varia- 
tions from this rule, an example of which is 
furnished in the rainfall of 1911, two-thirds 
of which came from July to December, inclu- 
sive. The records also show that very wet De- 
cembers, such as we have had at the close of 
1911, do not come often. Away back in the 
70 's there were four Decembers which averaged 
over three inches. At Ft. Sill for forty years, 
and at Ft. Reno for thirty years, there is shown 
to be only one four-inch rainfall for December. 
The average December rainfall is about one and 
a half inches, with many of them practically 
nothing. May, as we all know, is the most re- 
liable month for rain, but for the forty years 
it shows a range of from nothing, in the year 
1870, to 15.65 in 1905, with an average for the 
entire time of over five inches. Only four years 
out of the forty show less than two inches. 

In examining the records for all these years, 
it is interesting to note how often a wet month 
is followed by a dry month during the growing 
season. This fact has a most important bear- 
ing on the methods of culture and the kind of 
crops necessary to make the greatest average 
yields. It indicates the need of stored moisture 
at all times, and the value of proper cultivation 
to conserve it. But above all, it means that the 
crop which may damage seriously in a day or a 
week by heat or lack of moisture, must be re- 



184 SUEE FEED CEOPS 

placed by one which can not only stand the heat 
but can wait several weeks for rain if it has to, 
and then go on and make a profitable yield. 
Then, too, when we find that of all the years 
for which we have records in Western Okla- 
homa, half of the Julys 'show less than a two- 
inch rainfall, it means that nine times out of 
ten, for those years, the yield of corn will be 
greatly reduced. 

Upon closer investigation the facts become 
all the more startling for the corn crop when 
the records show that for fifteen years out 
of the forty at Ft. Sill, and twelve years out 
of the thirty at Ft. Eeno, the average of the 
combined rainfall for the months of June and 
July does not amount to four inches. This 
means that for Western Oklahoma, we may ex- 
pect a little more than one year of every three 
to bring us a June and July in which corn, on 
the uplands at least, cannot hope to make a 
profitable yield. 

The purpose of this discussion, or rather sum- 
ming up, of the rainfall for Western Oklahoma, 
is not to explode anybody's theory nor shake 
the faith in any interests invested hef*e o'r which 
may be planning to come here; and above all, 
it is not to make any farmer feel that his farm 
is worth any less today than it ever was.. It is 
simply an honest effort to get together a few 
dependable facts about what we may expect to 
be ours in the way of rainfall for the future. 

And from this we conclude: 



RAINFxVLL AND CROPS 185 

First, that no farmer west of Meridian 98 
should let any kind of preachment, previous 
condition of servitude, or preference as to pre- 
cipitation, make him forget where **he is af. 

Second, that the average rainfall of his local- 
ity should be ascertained and taken seriously; 
not because any possible profits of farming in 
such locality are determined solely by such rain- 
fall, but because the kind of farming, and the 
variety of crops through which, these profits 
may accrue, are most certainly 'determined by 
the average rainfall of that locality. 

Third, that the rainfall for Western Okla- 
homa, though irregular a^d once in a great 
while distressingly short, is ample for profitable 
crop production; provided we, as far as pos- 
sible, store that rainfall when git comes, plant 
mostly such crops as have proven themselves 
able to make yields on the worst years, and 
give more attention to the proper preparation 
and cultivation of the soil. Briefly stated, it 
would be: conservation of moisture, adaptation 
of crops, and scientific soil culture. 



INDEX 



PAGE 

Alfalfa 32-100 

after cowpeas 76 

amount of seed 62 

and barley 79 

and crab grass 85 

and Johnson grass .... 82 

bacteria 81 

best market 91 

best mill 92 

breaking a crust 83 

cultivation 67 

deep seed bed 56 

dying out 80 

feeding value 95 

fertility important .... 55 

fertilizer constituents . . 96 

for bee-keeping 100 

for feeding cattle 97 

for feeding hogs 98 

for horses 97 

for poultry feeding .... 99 

hay 65 

hay, grades of 91 

in Arkansas 89 

in humid climate 74 

in kaflrcorn stubble. . .73, 75 

in oats 77 

In orchard 73 

in rotation 78 

in rows 70 

in the dairy ration .... 98 

in the spring 93 

in. w^heat 76 

irrigating 88 

is invulnerable 53 

methods of curing .... 66 

on corn land 58 

on new lands 61 

on sandy lands 60, 71 

on sod 71 

on stubble lands 56 

pasture for hogs 94 

pasturing 93 

reseeding in spring .... 77 

seed crop 68 

seed testing 62, 81 

soils 54 

spring seeding 59 

webworms 68 

"will not grow" 63 



Bermuda grass 185-163 

eradicating 163 

experiences 140-156 

for hog pasture 161 

fourteen years' results. . 135 

hardy 138 

in sod 158 

limits 139 

on gumbo land 159 

on sandy loam pasture.. 159 
on upland pasture .... 160 
pasture becomes sodbound 162 

produces seed 163 

specific questions ...156-161 
starting from seed .... 139 
starting in pasture . . . 158 

varieties of 157 

Bermuda hay, for feeding 

to horses 161 

Blackhull white kafircorn.. 12 
Bloat of cattle on alfalfa. 95 

Bound kaflrcorn 15 

Bromus inermis 167 

Canada bluegrass 164 

Care of young alfalfa 64 

Climatic conditions 1 

Clover, Japan 165 

Colorado grass 124 

Concerning markets for ka- 
flrcorn 17 

Cottonseed, a sure feed 

crop 44 

should be sold 45 

Cottonseed hulls 46 

Cottonseed meal 46 

fed to hogs 49 

fed to stock cattle 47 

for calves 51 

for dairy cows 48 

for fattening steers ... 48 

for horses 47 

Cottonseed products . . . .44-52 

Cowpea seed 108 

Cowpeas 100-111 

alternate rows 102 

amount of seed 108 

as a catch crop 108 

experience 109 

feeding value 106 



186 



INDEX 



187 



PAGE 

for hay 105 

in the south 100 

on upland soils 101 

replace clover 100 

require cultivation .... 101 

varieties 107 

weevil damage 108 

Cultivating alfalfa 82 

Cultivation of kaflrcorn . . 13 

Curing alfalfa hay 87 

Curly mesquite 160 

Decayed vegetable matter 

for alfalfa 61 

Desert wheat 44 

Disking alfalfa land .57 

Dodder in alfalfa 69,87 

Fall seeding of alfalfa .... 58 

Feed is wasted 105 

Feed, regular supplies of.. 1 

Grasses, adaptation of . . . 134 

and clovers 164 

for Eastern Kansas.... 168 

native 135 

varieties tested 135 

Green manuring 104 

Growing kaflrcorn 11 

Harvesting kaflrcorn .... 14 

Harvesting milomaize .... 38 

Heading kaflrcorn 16 

Hilling up peanuts 115 

Hog pasture 178 

Indian corn, failures .... 7 

Japan clover 165 

Johnson grass 171 

Kaflrcorn 7-33 

blight 24 

cash returns 9 

dries out soil 26 

experiences 27-33 

for calves 19 

for dairy cows 20 

for fattening hogs -^1 

for fattening steers .... 20 

for growing pigs 21 

for horses 19 

for poultry 23 

in Texas Panhandle 15 

made slow progress ... 7 

methods of feeding .... 18 

positively prohibited ... 11 

^'ruins land" 25 



PAGE 

seed 24 

silage 23 

smut 23 

supreme test 8 

Laxative feeds 66 

Markets for kaflrcorn 17 

for milomaize 38 

Measuring stacked hay ... 90 

Millet 123-124 

hay 124 

Texas 124 

Milomaize 33-44 

dwarf yellow 35 

experiences 40-43 

for feeding 38 

for horses 39 

growing 37 

harvesting with machin- 
ery 34 

matures grain early ... 35 

place of 33 

uniform product 36 

value of 33 

Oats after alfalfa 75 

Pasture, The 134-178 

Pasture crops 177 

Teanuts 111-118 

distance between 114 

early cultivation 114 

for cattle 117 

for feeding hogs 116 

for market 117 

harvesting 115 

in Western Oklahoma... Ill 

planting 113 

Poisoning gophers in al- 
falfa 86 

Production must replace 

speculation 3 

Rainfall and Crops 179-185 

Rainfall does not increase. 4 
Red top 164 

Sand lucerne 166 

"Scientiflc agriculture" . . 5 

Silage ..125-133 

cash value 133 

corn 1.30 

crops for 128 

fattening steers 131 

for dairy cattle 132 

for hogs 133 

for idle horses 133 

is rough feed 130 



)EC 6 1912 



188 



INDEX 



PAGE 

SUos 126 

filling 128 

sealing 129 

size 127 

types 126 

Sorghum 118-123 

for hay 119 

for seed 120 

"hard on the land" ... 118 

hay, feeding value .... 122 

needs rich land 119 

new varieties 43 

on sandy soils 123 

pasturing 121 

poisoning 121 

smut 123 

Sowing aUalla t « 1 1 • « • • • • ^^ 



PAOB 

Sweet clover 169 

Sweet sorghum or cane... 118 
System of farming 2 

Thiclsening thin alfalfa. .68, 83 

Threshing liafircorn 17 

Timothy 164 

Turkestan alfalfa 89 

Warm soil for Isaflrcorn . . 12 
Water near surface for 

alfalfa 85 

Weevil damage in cowpea 

seed 108 

Wheat and rye 177 

When a corn crop fails . . 37 




W&IS!; CONGRESS 




0000=335'^-^t,S 



